Bits and Pieces
by Wordsplat
Summary: Various things I've written and posted on tumblr. Each piece is complete on its own and separate from the others. All Steve/Tony, occasional others thrown in.
1. Three Sentence Fics

**1950's:**

He spots him across the Stork Club through a bustling crowd, dancing with a real pretty dame, a brunette with bright red lips quirked up in an amused, affectionate smile. Tony's not watching her, though, he's watching the blond stepping on her toes, the gorgeous man with the apologetic smile and eyes like nothing Tony's ever seen. He recognizes the burst of heady, electric _desire_ in his veins, and, startled and horrified at his own reaction, he downs his last drink before clearing out to find another club.

**Beauty and the Beast:**

Steve is entirely certain he's getting Stockholm Syndrome, and he is entirely certain that he doesn't care. Tony can be snappish and coarse and frankly an ass—and it's probably best not to think about the part where he kept him locked in the dungeon, though really, it was only one night—but there's more to him, too. He's kind, when he thinks no one's watching, brave and brilliant and even a bit charming, and Steve wonders why he didn't see it there before.

**Policemen in a bar:**

"Y'know Cap, I've got better booze back at my place we could try…if you wanted to come home with me."

Steve shot him a dry, unimpressed look, clearly asking if after ten years on the force together, after ten years of ridiculously inappropriate flirting and ogling his ass in the Captain's uniform and basically pining like a thirteen year old girl, _that_ was really the best Tony could do; Tony shrugged.

"Also I'm a little in love with you, but I was going to save that until after I got you spectacularly drunk and possibly rocked your world."

Steve waved for the tab.

**Tony's a thief, Steve works in an art gallery:  
**

To be fair, all he'd done was tackle the man—the thief, the small part of his brain still functioning hissed—and it wasn't his fault the psycho's plan of distraction had been a kiss. Yes, okay, it might have maybe stolen his breath away, but no one had to know that because what _had_ stolen his breath was that damn thief using his distraction to hit him in the solar plexus, _hard_, before dashing off into the night with his prize.

Yeah, Steve was definitely still getting fired.

**Hulkeye high school:**

Clint was not known for being subtle—or particularly patient, for that matter—so really, he displayed remarkable self-control waiting all of three days before leaning across their lab table to ask his adorable, too-cute-for-words lab partner,

"Bruce, darling, why are you doing science when you could be doing me?"

Bruce stuttered and dropped a beaker full of chemicals, but he was also the only one in the room who didn't groan at the cheesy line, so Clint was going to take that as a yes.

**Star Trek:**

Tony knows what he feels is completely illogical. He also knows his admiration for Captain Rogers is outside the bounds of friendly camaraderie, even outside the bounds of their already unusually close friendship. He knows, and he says nothing, because while the human half of him may not mind trying for something out of his reach, the Vulcan half of him already knows every reason a relationship between them would fail, and he knows it would be his fault.

**Star Trek, part two:**

Steve knows exactly what Tony would say about his feelings, can practically hear his first officer telling him how illogical he's being in that arrogant, unnecessarily sassy tone he uses when he knows he's right. And maybe Tony would be right—maybe loving an impossibly frustrating, button-pushing half-Vulcan is completely and utterly illogical—but Tony is also the best friend Steve's ever had, and he's been falling headfirst for the man since the moment they met. Clearly, Steve's never really been the logical type anyway.

**Destiel in an Avengers setting:**

"So, did it hurt when you fell from heaven?" Dean asked, leaning as faux-casually as he could against the doorframe of the debrief room, blocking Captain America's exit and trying not to look like he'd spent the entire debrief debating which pick-up line to use.

"I did not fall from anywhere, I am perfectly fine," Castiel answered, perplexed, "You, however, fell three stories earlier and should be in the medical ward, Iron Man."

Damn it.

**Hairspray:**

"Hurry up, Buck, we're gonna miss him!" Steve urged as he skidded through the door, clicking on the tv as the theme song started up.

Bucky made a face, but didn't protest as Steve dragged him into the room right as _he_ came on the tv, turning his dame Pepper in a spin. He saw Tony around school, but the gorgeous teen paid him no mind; at least watching the show, Steve could pretend it was him Tony was winking at. 

**Omega Steve:**

"I'll beat 'em to hell," Tony growled, brushing a thumb over Steve's bruised cheekbone.

"That's sweet, Tony," Steve said, smiling softly at his ridiculous alpha's over-protective streak, "But it's alright, I was the one who picked a fight in the first place."

"Nope, still gonna kick their asses," Tony told him, leaning in to kiss Steve firmly and decisively.

**High school cafeteria:**

Tony is scrawny, insolent, and, as Rhodey once so eloquently put it, has 'more metal in his mouth than sense in his head'. Steve is stunning, kind-hearted, and Captain of the football team. Steve bumped into him in the cafeteria once, and said all of "sorry"; Tony has been envisioning their wedding ever since.

**Domestic:**

He pokes his baby in it's chubby little side, listens to it giggle, and thinks idly that if rainbows and sunshine made noise they would sound like Peter-giggles. He prods its cheeks next, watches adoringly as a bright, gummy grin stretches across—

"Stop poking the baby, Tony, Jesus, he's not a toy."

**Little Red Riding Hood:**

"I feel silly."

"Relax, you're rocking it, baby," Tony murmured with a smirk and a teasing snap of his teeth, "Now get over here so I can eat you right up."

"Wrong fairytale. And this doesn't even have a hood, it's just…" Steve's voice dropped to a whisper, _"Lingerie."_

"You—" Tony pulled him into his lap with a sweet smile and a sweeter kiss. "—are ridiculous. Sexy, but ridiculous."

**1920's:**

Steve knows that it's wrong. God, how he knows that it's wrong. More than that, however, he knows that he would sacrifice every shred of morality, of conformity, of normality, for one more stolen moment with the man he loves.

**Medieval:  
**

Steve would follow his Prince to the ends of the earth without hesitation, but that was just his duty, clearly nothing more. Prince Anthony was spoiled, was snarky and brash and attracti—_arrogant_. He meant arrogant. 

**Blind Tony:**

Thing is, Tony was so tactically brilliant and well-practiced that it took Steve weeks to notice. Whenever Tony wasn't in the Iron Man suit, he wore these gaudy, hipster sunglasses, and Steve couldn't understand why he never took them off. Finally, he gave up and just asked about it; Tony laughed so hard Steve thought he might hack up a lung, and when Tony finally managed to spit out a startled, hysterical, _ohmigod, I'm blind, you idiot_, Steve had never wanted to melt into the ground more in his entire life.

**Incubus Tony:**

All in all, having an incubus for a boyfriend wasn't really all that bad. He had an unbelievably high sex drive, but hey, so did Steve, and it made for some fun nights—nights, mornings, afternoons, any time they could get their hands on each other, really—so that part was fantastic. The tail was a little strange, but he supposed he could learn to live with worse.

**Steve is Tony's PA:**

Pepper, in her eternal wisdom, decided when she left for her honeymoon her replacement ought to be male and therefore Stark-proof. Neither she nor Tony anticipated Steve Rogers, who clearly existed purely to give Tony an incredibly belated and completely unexpected sexual crisis; unfortunately, Steve seemed to be under the impression that he existed to make Tony sign things and attend meetings. He blushed from head to toe when Tony finally asked him to dinner though, so Tony counted that as a win.

**Bookshop:**

Tony had tried to keep it classy, or at least subtle, but if the sign in the bookstore reading, "Put us out of our misery and just ask him out already!" was anything to go by, Steve, or at least Steve's coworkers, might've caught on.

"You asked me to help you find the Great Gatsby," Steve told him over coffee later, and cut Tony off with a fond eye roll before he could protest, _"Eleven times."_

**College:**

The fact that it took him—a _genius_, thank you very much—so long to realize he was in love with his best friend was, frankly, embarrassing. Steve had just always been there, and the sudden idea that Tony might lose him, that they might move to different cities and grow apart and only ever communicate through texts or letters or whatever else was complete and utter _bullshit_. The idea of never losing him sort of snowballed from _hey please don't leave me I kind of like your face a lot_ to _I'd really like to wake up to you every morning for possibly the rest of my life _and before Tony knew it he was grabbing Steve by the front of his robes and kissing him in front of their entire graduating class.

**Baby Steve explaining his Bucky Bear:**

"D'you think we could we share him, maybe?" the boy who had tried to steal Steve's Bucky bear earlier, Tony, rolled over on his nap mat to face Steve with all the seriousness a four year old could muster, "I had a Rhodey bear, but Daddy took him away cause I made his desk 'splode an' now I can't sleep."

"You hafta be real nice," Steve warned seriously, "He's sens'tive, specially bout his arm. You can't tug 'im. Promise you won't?"

"Promise." Tony nodded hastily.

Steve carefully put his Bucky bear between their nap mats, and both boys fell asleep shortly after, each with an arm wrapped around the shared bear.

**Pepper with Extremis:**

"Pepper, darling, light of my life, we talked about thi—" Tony started, then stopped when his lovely, wonderful, cruel girlfriend once again flew _his_ suit out of his reach, "Damn it, Pepper, this isn't fair, I'm Iron Man, it's my thing, I thought we agreed on this!"

Pepper—beautiful, sweet, evil Pepper—just giggled, "It's not my fault your toys like me better now."

"They most certainly do _no_—Dum-E, nod in agreement one more time and I'll mail you straight to the scrap yard, first-class!"

**Hollywood:**

When Tony kisses him, he kisses with open mouths and bumping teeth and hands burning into his hips, until all Steve can feel is the heat of Tony against him, the loose, easy pleasure of it, the roll of his hips and the lave of his tongue and the small, almost inaudible noise he makes against Steve's mouth when the director calls cut. Steve knows it's only because Tony's a good actor, and he hopes Tony will chalk the desperation of Steve's own grabbing hands up to the same. He knows Tony doesn't like him, that he's just immersing himself in the scene like he ought to, but Steve can't help hoping the director will want to re-shoot it all the same.

**Supernatural starring Steve and Tony:**

"C'mon baby, if we can stop an alien invasion we can hunt a couple demons," Tony tells Steve with a grin, tugging him into a quick kiss for the road. Before they can load up, however, the angel guy—Castor? Cas something—stops Tony with an inquisitive, strangely serious look.

"I do not understand," he says, quirking his head at Steve now, "He is not an infant."

Tony leans around Cas to give the Winchester kid a look.

"Do you want to teach your pet angel about terms of endearment, or is that on me?"

**Genderswapped:**

"I am so done with this," Steve grumbled as he—she? No, he, definitely he, this was reversible, it _had_ to be—tripped in his heels for what must've been at least the sixth time.

"And I'm done with your bitching," Tony decided, except, it wasn't Tony, it was some female that talked and acted and vaguely looked like Steve's usually very male best friend, "We're going to get hot—well, Pepper and Natasha will make us hot, I'm not even sure where to start with all that primping and prodding and whatever it is they do—and then we're going to out and make the best of a shitty situation."

"How can you possibly think of going out right now?"

"Hey, if I can't have my dick, I think I at least deserve a free drink."

**High school musical:**

When Tony is pushed up on stage for karaoke, he bitches and moans before accepting the mike shoved into his hands with begrudging resentment, while his jerk friends cheer and whoop triumphantly. When he sees his partner though—blonde and bashful, blushing a faint pink only barely visible in the dim rec hall lighting, with the most gorgeous eyes Tony's ever seen—well, maybe Tony could stand to sing a little more often.

_"This could be the start, of something new / it feels so right, to be here with you / and now, looking in your eyes / I feel in my heart, the start of something new…"_

**Steve is Tony's family slave:**

Tony was not known for his love of convention; stuffy clothes and pompous decorum and the weighty, stifling expectations his father set upon his shoulders had always felt more like a burden than a privilege. So really, it hadn't surprised Tony as much as it should have that Steven—fascinating, maddening, completely-against-every-societal-norm-to-desire Steven—had managed to wrap Tony around his little finger from just about the moment they met. Steven hadn't had the slightest idea of course, that much had been rather obvious, but…well, he probably figured it out sometime around the point Tony hauled him out to the farthest reaches of the Stark property and kissed him like he was drowning for it.

**True Love's Kiss:  
**

When Loki said the spell could be broken only by True Love's Kiss, they'd all pretty much assumed he'd been fucking with them. When Steve was still asleep a week later though, Tony couldn't help himself; it wasn't that he _really_ thought he was Steve's True Love—he was a narcissist, but even he wasn't stupid enough to think _he_ of all people could be Steve's True Love, if things like that even existed—but he couldn't resist the slim flicker of hope, however pointless.

Though, he supposed it didn't seem quite so pointless when Steve surged to life at the briefest touch of Tony's lips.


	2. Rescue-verse blurb

They were hosting a press conference in an hour.

It wasn't their first, not by a long shot; they'd been superheroes for far too long for press conferences to be anything but second nature. This was Peter's first press conference though, so he had to look sharp.

They'd kept the adoption under the radar, given themselves a month to work out the little kinks of the new family dynamic—which, apparently, included a shift in Steve and Tony's dynamic, but if you asked the team that had apparently been a long time coming—and now that things had settled down, they'd elected to address the press before the press found out on their own.

A superpowered child being adopted by New York's most beloved superheroes was a pretty big deal after all, and it certainly wasn't going to stay hushed up forever. Best to deal with things on their own terms now than be ambushed later on.

Steve was showering in one of the guest bathrooms on the ground floor, while Tony scrubbed Peter down in the master bath upstairs. Peter was complaining about having to get cleaned and dressed up, squirming out of Tony's reach and splashing around and generally causing a fuss.

"Peter, sit _still," _Tony huffed, taking Peter by the arm and pulling him back down, "I'm not done, you still need shampoo."

"But I _hate _shampoo—!" Peter squawked indignantly, squirming again.

"Don't you want to look nice for the cameras?" Tony tried.

"No."

"Yes you do, now hold still or it's gonna get in your eyes."

"How come I can't wear normal clothes?" Peter complained.

"It's just a suit, it's not the end of the world. Trust me, you've got plenty more in your future, better get comfortable in it."

"But it suuucks—" Peter whined.

"Tell you what." Tony sighed, giving in and resorting to bribery. "You can wear my shiny reactor cufflinks, okay?"

"I can?" Peter brightened.

"Yeah. They're just in the closet here—"

Tony didn't leave Peter alone, didn't even fully turn his back; all it took was ten paces to the closet. In the blink of an eye, Peter was scrambling up the edge of the tub, sliding the window open, and crawling down the side of the building.

"Jesus fucking Christ—" Tony swore.

He sprinted back across the room, dove over the tub and halfway out the window, trying to grab Peter before he was out of reach, but it was already too late. All he could see was Peter's naked butt as he wiggled his way down the side of the building.

"YOU BETTER HOPE YOU DEVELOP INVISIBILITY IN THE NEXT TEN SECONDS, SQUIRT!" Tony hollered out the window, "BECAUSE WHEN I CATCH YOU, YOU ARE _DEAD!"_

Furious, Tony slammed the window shut. The movement threw him off balance, and he teetered briefly before slipping and crashing into the still full tub. Thankfully he hadn't gotten dressed for the conference yet, so he was just a ratty muscle tee and jeans, but he was still soaked and utterly pissed.

"I'm gonna fucking kill that kid—"

"Sir, Captain Rogers wishes to know if everything is alright."

"Tell him _his kid _just ducked out the window and is now climbing down the building buck ass naked."

Tony scrambled out of the tub while he waited for Steve's reply, stripping off his now far too constrictive jeans. He didn't have time to put on another pair of pants, not with his demonic, naked son surely making for the backyard. There was a huge mud puddle Tony just _knew _the kid was gunning for—he'd spent an hour dragging Peter away from it this morning—and he really didn't want to waste another scrubbing him clean again. Thor walked around naked half the time anyway, boxers were more than fine for chasing his idiot son back into the tub.

"Captain Rogers would like me to inform you that young sir's preference for nudity and mayhem is entirely your doing." JARVIS replied while Tony raced down the stairs, the AI's tone heavily implying his agreement.

"Yeah, well, remind him who asked who for a kid, and who warned who about shackling their life to eccentric dumbasses who don't know what they're doing."

"Captain Rogers wishes you to know that you're a wonderful father, and that he would shackle himself to you over someone sane any day of the week."

"Tell him if that was a marriage proposal, it was shit, you don't call people insane while you propose to them, and I _at least _deserve dinner and a ring. Also, he should be on his knees, preferably twice."

JARVIS kindly ignored the large, rather dopey grin on Tony's face even as he relayed his instructions.

"He says you're rather smug for someone who just lost a five year old out a window."

"I didn't _lose _him—"

"Also, that if that was _your _idea of a proposal, it was hardly much better."

Tony grinned.

He opened his mouth to reply, but canned it when he skidded into the kitchen and caught sight of Peter out back through the sliding glass door, rolling around in the mud.

Of course.

"Peter Benjamin Parker, you are in _so much trouble_—_!_"

Peter took off immediately. Tony was through the door in seconds, chasing Peter around the yard until he managed to grab the kid around the waist. He only had him for a second though, then Peter shot webbing in his face and sped off into the tower.

Tony clawed the webbing off his face and took chase after Peter. At some point down the hallway of guest bedrooms they picked up Steve, who ducked out in nothing more than a towel, hair still slicked and skin still soaked. He followed after them both, adding his calls of "Peter, so help me God!" to Tony's "You're _dead, _you hear me?"

It was like that, Peter naked and covered in mud, Tony in an oil-stained muscle tee and Captain America boxers, Captain America himself two steps behind in nothing but a fuzzy towel held up with one hand while he tried to snag Peter with the other, that they raced past the press.

It was Peter who saw them first and skidded to a halt in the foyer, while Tony tackled him less than a second later from behind and Steve crashed into them both right after, feet too wet to slow down on the tile.

The reporters watched them in stunned silence for a very long moment. Pepper was amongst them, apparently having let them inside for the conference, though her expression was less surprised and more resigned. Peter turned bright red, Tony tried to get his brain to reboot, and Steve just did his best to keep himself covered.

In the end, it was a junior reporter was the first to blurt out a reaction.

"You're the people who fought killer aliens from outer space?"

There was another long pause, and it was Pepper who sighed.

"Unfortunately."


	3. Teen Peter in Avengers Tower

"—so, I just want you to know, I'm totally yours in the divorce."

"What do you mean, divorce? Who got divorced?" Tony mumbled through his sandwich, finally tuning back in to Peter's long-winded rant. "Scratch that, who got married?"

"Well, not really divorced, just broke up, but." Peter shrugged. "You know what I mean."

"I really don't." Tony raised an eyebrow. The spider-kid had moved in just a few days ago. He was fun to have around, eager to learn and exceedingly helpful in the lab, but for all his intelligence, Tony sometimes wondered if he was really all there. "Who broke up?"

"You and…Steve?" Peter blinked.

"What? We didn't break up." Tony frowned, then called loudly up the stairs, "Steve!"

"What?" Steve shouted back.

"Did we break up?"

"Are you insane?"

"Peter says he's mine in the divorce!"

"We're not married!"

"Well, _I _know that!"

"What do you mean, you're not broken up?" Peter made a wild hand gesture. "Less than half an hour ago you were screaming bloody murder at each other. Steve punched a hole in the wall!"

"One of many." Clint snorted from across the table.

"We fight." Tony shrugged. "It happens."

"We're always going to fight." Steve entered the kitchen, tossing his workout rag in Tony's face as he passed to get food from the fridge. "Tony can be an arrogant bastard."

"And Steve can be a stubborn jackass." Tony used the rag to smack Steve's arm irritably.

"But there's only one Tony Stark in the world," Steve continued, "I'm not keen on letting him go just for being a pain in the rear every once in a while."

"Same." Tony nodded. "Insert 'Steve Rogers' and 'reckless idiot'."

"That's rich, coming from you."

"Says the man who jumps out of planes without parachutes on a _near weekly basis _though I have offered time and time again to build one into your suit—"

"It would be too bulky—"

"Don't insult my capabilities, it would not and you know it—"

"I don't need one all the time—"

"Just when you're trying to give me a heart attack—"

"I'm not a child, I know what I'm doing—"

"I have a _heart condition, _Steve, are you trying to kill me?"

"You have shrapnel in your chest, that's not a heart condition, stop being melodramatic—"

"Oh, no, that's right, you're only trying to kill _yourself_—" 

"I'm not going to die from a little fall_, _Tony, I have the superserum—" 

"A _little—_it was more than a thousand feet in the air! The superserum's not going to magically re-inflate you if you become a star-spangled pancake!"

The couple continued to bicker amongst themselves, and Peter looked to Clint.

"So this is…normal?"

"This is a good day." Clint chuckled, taking another gulp of his orange juice. "Wait til one of them _actually _gets hurt. There's a brief period during which they're disgustingly sweet to each other, then the minute the broken one is fully healed, they start screaming their lungs out at each other for at least a week."

"In between the sex," Bruce pointed out as he entered, making a beeline for the coffee machine.

"What?" Peter gaped.

"He's right, after a scare they go at it worse than the time AIM filtered sex pollen into our ventilation system." Clint snorted. "But don't worry kid, JARVIS'll keep you from getting an eyeful."

"I made a really bad decision coming to live here, didn't I?"

"Nah, you get used to it." Clint waved his concern off.

"If they hate each so much, why are they even together?"

"Hate each…?" Clint boggled at him. Then with a shake of his head and a devious smirk, he picked up the kitchen knife he'd been using to cut his chicken. "Watch this."

Clint twirled the knife in his fingers once, then sent it flying at Tony's head. Peter barely had time to blink before Steve had Tony pinned to the floor, and Clint shot out of his chair and raced down the hallway.

"Clinton Francis Barton, so help me God, if you launch one more projectile at Tony I'll have you on solitary clean-up duty for a year, you hear me?" Steve hollered, red-faced in anger.

He stood, and bent to offer Tony a hand up. Though Steve's reaction had been immediate and the knife had come nowhere near Tony, Steve clasped Tony's face in his hands anyway, turning him this way and that, examining him for any imagined cuts or marks.

"Are you alright?"

"I am. Clint won't be when I'm through with him." Tony snorted, though he didn't bat Steve's probing, worried hands away like Peter would've thought. He seemed to expect the scrutiny, and stood there patiently until Steve was satisfied.

"Me first." Steve scowled. "He's upgrading. Last time it was just a book."

"I think he just used whatever was on hand, babe." Tony patted Steve's arm.

Then they were out the door, apparently to get Clint back somehow. Peter turned to Bruce in bewilderment, hoping for some sort of explanation.

"Don't ask me what goes through their heads." He just shrugged, leaning against the counter and taking a sip of his coffee. "They're in love. They make it work. Don't try get involved if you value your sanity. That's all the advice I've got for you."

Peter let his head fall to the table with a groan.

Coming to live with the Avengers had been his worst decision yet.


	4. Steve dies

He can't breathe.

There's no other way to describe the aching loss of it, the way every breath Steve's gone feels carved right out of his lungs. He remembers being waterboarded in Afghanistan and thinks it's like that, except he doesn't care if he's ever let up again. He just wants to drown already. Some days, he can muster his emotions; he can feel abandoned, feel betrayed, feel furious. But then he remembers the way Steve had smiled at him only moments before they'd gone into battle, happy and confident and so goddamn young, and he's drowning again.

The funeral is a fucking sham. Steve would've hated it. All the stuffy, pompous military bastards Steve found insufferable quoting poets Steve didn't like and parts of the Bible he never agreed with, using his dead fucking body to push their own agenda. Tony is supposed to speak. He can't find the air to. Weeks later he holds a funeral of his own, a real one, and only the Avengers are in attendance. He manages to get the words out this time. He speaks about Steve until his voice is hoarse, but it isn't enough, and nothing ever could be.

He destroys his workshop. Fucking wrecks it. It'll take him months to restore some of the projects he demolishes, but what else is he going to do with his time? He doesn't sleep anymore, and he doesn't have Steve to talk to when the nightmares rise like bile, so he's back to his age-old therapy of create and destroy, create and destroy, create and destroy until he can finally manage to destroy himself once and for all. He wants to get drunk, but he can't get the look Steve always gave him out of his head, so he doesn't. It's worse that way, sober, and Tony thinks, _I deserve this_.


	5. Tony embarrasses Peter

Steve had only told Tony about a hundred thousand times in the past nine years Peter had been attending school—including preschool and kindergarten—that wearing wife beaters to pick their son up from school was Not Appropriate. Something about having images to uphold, being national icons, et cetera. So as Tony hustled out the door to pick Pete up from school, he grabbed the nearest thing that caught his sight—the sweater Steve had given him last Christmas—and shrugged it on without thinking much other than that it'd save him a lecture.

So he was a bit confused when he pulled up to the curb, Peter took one look at him, and baulked.

"C'mon Pete, hop to it," Tony called.

"No. No, no way." Peter shook his head quickly, eyes wide. A girl looked at him, and he quickly added, "This man is not my father. I have never seen him before in my life, I swear."

"One of these days someone's going to believe you." Tony just rolled his eyes.

"Good, maybe then you won't pick me up in ugly sweaters anymore!"

"Pops got this for me for Christmas, thank you very much." Tony just huffed, not at all embarrassed.

"It's glowing, Dad!"

"It's Rudolph, of course it glows."

"It's _April_, what is _wrong_ with you?"

"Can I come home with you?" The Wilson kid Peter couldn't seem to shake appeared beside him on the curb. "Pretty please?"

"Not now, Wade," Peter grumbled, so Wade turned to Tony.

"I love your sweater sir can I come home with your son?"

"Why thank you, yes you may," Tony told Wade, then turned to Peter, "See? Your friends have good taste."

"He's not my friend, Dad! Wade, get out of my car!" Peter protested, horrified, "Dad, do not let him come home with us!"

"Fine. Wade, you're out, Pete, you're in, it's time to roll."

"Aw!" Wade complained, but Peter was already talking again.

"There is no 'rolling' here, it is not 'time to roll', no one says that, Dad, god."

"Pops says it."

"Pops is a hundred years old!"

"I know, and he married me to keep him hip and happening." Tony winked, and Peter sank to the curb with a groan.

"Why is this my life?"

"C'mon Pete, I have things to do today," Tony insisted, "Chop chop."

"You just want to get home in time to watch that stupid show teenage werewolf show with Pops."

"Lies."

"Why couldn't I have had normal parents?"

"You got lucky, now get in the car."

"Not with you dressed like that."

"Peter, if you make me miss the opening sequence and therefore Tyler Hoechlin's abs, I swear I will pick you up next time in the Ironette costume I wore last Halloween, you know I will—"

"Jesus, Dad, I'm in the car already, just drive!"


	6. Tony is blunt but Steve is receptive

"We should have sex."

Steve was pretty sure he'd heard that wrong. He had to have, because Tony was just standing in front of him, pajama clad, hair mussed, coffee in hand, peering in Steve's direction as casually as if he'd asked Steve to please move out of his way. Maybe he had. That would make a hell of a lot more sense. It would also mean his infatuation with Tony had progressed to mid-morning delusions, which was probably—definitely—a step in the wrong direction, but he digressed.

More importantly, he'd been staring at Tony dumbly for a rather long time.

"Tony—" Steve opened his mouth to say something, then promptly closed it. Unsure of what Tony had asked in reality, he couldn't provide proper answer. Honesty was the best he could do. "I don't know what to say."

"Start with yes."

"Could you ask the question again?"

Tony made the same sort of face at Steve he'd made last night when he couldn't get Clint's new poison arrows to disintegrate the way he wanted them to. Steve wasn't sure what exactly that meant.

"I said we should have sex."

Steve was pretty sure he was dreaming, at this point. Though, usually in such dreams, there was less talking and more pressing Tony up against the kitchen counter. Or bending him over the mission room table. Or anywhere, really. Steve's overactive imagination didn't tend to be picky.

"What do you mean?"

"I'm not sure I can make it a whole lot clearer for you, buddy." Tony was obviously amused now. "You know what sex is, right?"

"I'm aware," Steve replied dryly, deciding not to mention the fact that he dreamt about it with increasing frequency and startling detail since moving into the tower.

"We—you and I, Tony and Steve, Cap and Iron Man if you want, that could be kinky—should find a bed—or a couch, a table, hell, the floor as long as I'm not the one on my back because I'm not exactly forever twenty-five like other people in this room—and have sex, fuck, screw, do the beast with two backs, whatever you want to call it cause, hey, again, not picky."

Steve blinked.

"Shit, did I break y—?" Steve crowded Tony up against the wall, swallowing the rest of his sentence with a fierce kiss.

Tony always did find the strangest way to go about things, but Steve couldn't really find it in himself to mind.


	7. Avengers become baby chicks

Steve stood stock still for a long moment.

"I don't understand," he admitted at last.

"Team leader." Nick pointed at him, then at the box of baby chicks he'd just shoved into Steve's hands. "Your problem."

"What does being team leader have to do…with…" Steve trailed off as one of the chicks in the box started flying.

Using its little, red and gold, chicky armor.

"Tony?" Steve's voice was a little squeakier than he would've liked, but.

His boyfriend was a chick.

The baby-rooster kind, not the slang-for-a-woman kind. Steve wasn't sure if that was better or worse or just yet another kind of weird. Examining the other yellow puff-balls in the box, Steve could actually kind of pick them out now. One even had a cluster of red-orange feathers tucked behind its head, somewhat like the hair of a familiar assassin.

"Please tell me this is an unnecessarily elaborate prank," Steve pleaded.

"Yeah, I like to build chick-sized armor in my free time," Nick grumbled irritably, swatting Tony down back into the box.

"Hey!" Steve shot a distressed glare at Nick, then hoisted the box with one hand so he could use the other to scoop Tony out. "Are you okay?"

Tony gave a little whine, but nuzzled Steve's palm. Steve had no idea how to interpret that.

"Loki?" Steve assumed, and Nick snorted.

"Count the chicks, Captain."

Steve did, trying to identify them as he went along. Tony was obvious. Red-feathers was probably Natasha. Thor had an itty bitty hammer balanced on his back. Then three he couldn't specify, which were probably Clint, Bruce, and…

"Who's the extra?"

Tony began cheeping at him indignantly, and Steve got the distinct impression Tony had forgotten he couldn't actually speak.

"Honey," Steve said gently, "I can't understand you."

Tony's beak twitched, giving him a distinctly horrified expression.

"He's trying to tell you Loki's spell was a little more powerful than Loki himself was anticipating." Nick poked around in the box a moment, before hoisting one up. "Keep eyes on this one, Cap."

"Uh." Steve gave a polite cough. "Sir?"

"I mean it." Nick glared at the chick, squeezing it a little. "This little rat with feathers went and—"

"Sir." Steve interrupted a bit more forcefully, though he was trying not to laugh. "I think that's Clint."

"What?" Nick squinted at the chick, who peeped loudly in agreement. "How can you tell?"

"Because I think Loki's the one trying to eat Thor's foot."

Steve gestured to the box, where one of the chicks was pecking angrily at the chick with the hammer on its back, presumably Thor. The minute Steve finished speaking, Loki slapped a wing at Thor's head and hopped away, squawking at Steve indignantly all the while.

"Do you think they can understand each other?" Steve peered into the box curiously.

"Let's hope you can." Nick gave a little snort, turning on his heel.

"Wait, I can't take care of these—uh, them—I don't know anything about…" Steve trailed off as Nick disappeared around a corner, disinterested in Steve's inabilities with animals.

Tony wiggled in his hand before launching up into the air again, little repulsors firing warm against Steve's palm before he flew up to land on Steve's shoulder and settle in. He gave a little nip at Steve's ear in something like a hello. Steve patted his iron exterior with a sigh.

This was going to be a long day.


	8. Pepper is queen

"This isn't what it looks like!"

"I remember when you used to say that to me." Pepper laughed, flicking to the next page of her magazine unperturbed.

"I can explain—"

"That too." Pepper flicked another page.

"Not helping." Tony stopped trying to salvage the situation long enough to glare at her. She lowered her magazine enough to raise an eyebrow at him, still completely uncaring of his woes.

"Uh, I—" Steve started, then stopped. He tried again. "Tony?"

"Like I said, this isn't what it looks like—"

"It looks like you're painting Pepper's toes in a maid's outfit." Steve blinked rapidly. His eyes ducked down, lingered, then darted back up. "A too-short maid's outfit."

"It was the only one that fit, okay? And screw you, I have fantastic thighs, I can show them off if I want to—"

"I know you do, and I know you can. I didn't say I didn't like the view, did I?" Steve did look a little warm under the collar, come to think of it. "Just curious why I'm receiving it. In your office. Your _work_ office."

"I may have lost a bet."

"I figured. Well, hoped."

"Hoped?"

"I'm not certain what it would say about my taste in men if you did this for kicks."

"Skirt not doing it for you?"

"Not particularly."

"Guess we can cross that one off the list."

"Not until you've finished my left foot, you can't." Pepper wiggled her toes, lowering her magazine once more to shoot Tony a withering look.

"I'll, uh." Steve glanced between them. "I think I'll take you for lunch tomorrow, instead."

"No, baby, come back, don't leave me alone with her, I love y—!"

The door shut in his face.

Damn it.


	9. Home Is Where the Time Machine Is blurb

Anna was thirteen when she brought her first boy home: Jack Cooper. He was fourteen, played basketball, and had the absolute cutest smattering of freckles across his cheeks. He came over to 'hang out', which she hoped could be code for a date, or at least a potential one.

When they walked in the door, Uncle Thor and her pops raced past, Uncle Clint and her dad on their respective shoulders, everyone naked except for boxers, whipped cream, and a lot of paint. Uncle Clint chose that particular moment to launch off Uncle Thor's shoulders and tackle Dad, and they all went crashing to the floor. As they all groaned in pain, Dad announced, far too loudly, "If that's not Steve's hand in my underwear right now, we're gonna have to talk boundaries again, guys."

Jack took a picture.

Pops, hearing the click of Jack's phone, swiveled his head. Catching sight of Jack, he shoved Dad off his stomach and sat up to chirp far too eagerly, "Oh, hello, are you Annie's boyfriend, the basketball player?"

Uncle Clint, hearing this, shot Jack in the crotch with his paintball gun. "Not anymore he's not."

As Jack doubled over with an admittedly rather high pitched noise, Uncle Thor told him disapprovingly, "Those are not the noises of a warrior. Anna, princess, find someone who will fight for your hand, not whine over it."

"Uncle Clint shot him!" Anna protested, "Of course he's going to sound like that! Jack, are you okay?"

"I don't sound like that when I get shot," Dad huffed.

"Yes you do," Pops told him.

"Can I go home now?" Jack whimpered.

She never did get that date, though she did later find the picture on stupidcelebs dot com.


	10. Tony and Steve have multi-verse children

"Um."

There were no words for this.

Tony was a genius and superhero. He both saw and created crazy, impossible things at least twice a week these days. So when JARVIS told him there had been an "event" in the living room, Tony had been prepared for a lot. A dozen mini-Steves of various ages sprawled on his couch was not quite strangest thing he'd seen, perhaps, but it was pretty damn high up there.

"Ada!"

The toddler was the first to spot him. Tony's eyes widened and he briefly considered bolting.

"Dad!"

"It's Daddy!"

"Why's your hair like that, Dad?"

Oh God.

The children converged, hopping off his couch and racing towards him on stubby legs, grinning toothy grins and opening their arms wide.

Yeah, he bolted.

"Steve!" he shouted, "What did you _do?"_

"Ton—? Oof!"

They collided, Steve turning the corner into the hallway just as Tony was racing out. They both hit the floor, and the mini-Steves caught up with them. Real Steve's eyes widened comically, and the children tackled them. One of the kids, maybe four or so, even crawled into Tony's lap and hugged him tightly around the waist.

"Daddy!"

"What happened, Dad?"

"Look, it's this verse's Pops!"

"Adadadada…" The youngest, maybe one and half or so, toddled around the corner, babbling to himself. The tyke threw his arms up jubilantly when he caught sight of Tony. "Ada!"

"Um," Tony repeated, too many questions blocking up his brain to get one out. The tiniest barreled towards him, stumbling over himself to clutch at Tony's shirt with his little hands, still babbling. "Oh god, it's drooling on me."

"Why do they all look like me?" Steve managed to ask, grabbing an older one by the back of the shirt, "What's your name, sport?"

"Whaddaya mean, what's my name?" The boy frowned. "Didja hit your head or somethin'?"

The oldest mini-Steve grabbed the younger one and pulled him away with a sigh.

"Liam, I told you, that's not Pop."

"Where did you all _come _from?" Tony managed to get his voice back. "JARVIS, tell the others we're going to need some assistance down here."

"Yes, sir."

"Dad, what's going on?"

"You're asking _me? _You're the ones in my house!" Tony protested.

"Which one of you is the oldest?" Steve asked curiously.

"Me," the oldest informed them, grabbing the toddler in Tony's lap and pulling him away, "Ronan, come here."

"Ada!" the toddler just screeched, upset, "Want ada!"

"That's not Daddy, Ro," the oldest insisted, picking up the toddler and looking at Tony and Steve seriously, "Guys, get behind me. Connor, go get Ollie off the couch, Fletch left him when he thought he saw Dad."

"I forgot it wasn't him." One of the boys squirmed while the others hastily followed orders, getting behind the oldest, who shielded them protectively even as he bounced the toddler, Ronan. "He _looks _like Dad."

"I know, Fletcher. Just get behind me, okay?" he turned to Steve and Tony next, who were still busy gaping, "My name is Steven Andrew Rogers, but you call me Andrew. You're this verses' Steve Rogers and Tony Stark, right?"

"Why do you all keep calling me Dad if you're clearly Steve's kids?" Tony managed.

"Do you have a Dr. Reed Richards in this universe?" the kid, Andrew, deflected neatly.

"Oh wow children," Clint interrupted abruptly, popping his head into the hallway, Natasha two steps behind him.

"Tony, what have you done now?" she sighed.

"It wasn't me!" Tony complained at the same time Ronan bubbled up, "Asha!"

"That's not Aunt Tasha, Ronan." Andrew sighed.

"Excuse me?" She raised an eyebrow.

"What's all this?" Bruce was the last to enter, looking as confused as any of them.

"The Dr. Richard of our universe fouled up," Andrew informed them crisply, "At least, that's my working assumption."

"You always told—er." One of the other boys, younger than Andrew but not by much, rubbed the back of his head as he looked at Tony sheepishly. "I mean, our parents, always told us if anything dimension-shifting happened it was likely to be Dr. Richards or Doctor Strange."

"And the Avengers were out assisting the Fantastic Four when the portal opened over Stark Tower," Andrew finished, "So we assume it's Dr. Richards. The portal sent us here just a moment ago."

"The Steve of your universe has _twelve kids?" _Clint gaped, the rest of the story not half as important.

"With _me?" _Tony glanced down at his very male body parts. "Okay, quick but very important sidebar: am I the chick in your universe, or is he?"

"We have two daddies and lotsa aunts and uncles and a Coulson and our family may be different but different is better so you can take your conformative beliefs and go suck it!" one of the younger ones piped up, looking quite offended.

"It's 'normative' beliefs, Liam." Andrew sighed. "And he wasn't being rude, he just wanted to know how we were made."

"I'm rather curious myself." Bruce examined one of the Steves curiously.

"AIM thought that Pops' serum-enhanced abilities and leadership skills would make a good match with Dad's intelligence and ingenuity. When Dad got turned into a woman by Loki, AIM managed to get a sample of female Dad's DNA. From that, they developed us." Andrew rolled up his sleeve, revealing a tattoo—A31. "They manufactured us for a couple years before Pops got wind of it. He and the Avengers crashed the labs and took us in."

"All _twelve _of you?" Steve blinked widely.

"There were originally over 3,600 of us and counting, but most didn't survive outside of a test tube."

"I have 3,600 multiverse children. With _Captain Ameri—_oh god, I need to sit down." Tony groaned.

"You are sitting," one of the mini-Steves pointed out.

"Then why is the world still spinning?"

"Because we have 3,600 multiverse children." Steve just blinked again, still unable to take his eyes off Andrew. "And twelve of them are in our living room."

"Right. Remind me, why did I want to join the Avengers Initiative again?"


	11. New Year's Eve

He had to just go for it.

Five more steps across the ballroom tile would be all it took. Five anxious, endless steps, and he'd be directly in view of the man he'd been so obviously watching all night. Five steps, and he could perfect or ruin his life. Perhaps that was a bit dramatic; regardless, five steps, and he would know for certain. Five steps, and all the little things he'd let give him hope over the years would be cemented in stone as a _yes _or a _no._

Five steps, and there could be no turning back.

Tony shrank back into the crowd as Steve turned his head. God, he was such a fucking coward. He turned away, pretended to be interested in a conversation about stocks until he was certain Steve hadn't seen him. He probably wasn't looking for Tony specifically; they hadn't seen each other all night, sure, but they hadn't made plans to, either. It was the Van Dyne's famous New Year's party, Steve would certainly understand if Tony was busy. Either way, Tony would prefer it if Steve didn't catch sight of him. Tony wasn't sure if he was going to be able to do this or not, and he'd rather not face Steve until he knew.

It should be easy. Everything else with Steve was. Well, 'easy' was perhaps the wrong word, they fought tenaciously, but there was something just so _natural _about it. As if they'd known each other decades instead of just six too-short years. He needed Steve like he needed nothing else, and maybe that was what made this all so damn hard. If Steve was just another pretty blonde, Tony could stride over and ask him to dance without a thought. Could ask him back to his place even, strike up a flirty conversation with suggestive innuendo and push his hand for a New Year's kiss with high hopes, and simply shrug and move along if he was shot down. There were no stakes, with simple pretty blondes.

With Steve, everything was at stake. More than just his heart, which could be damn fragile enough, but their friendship could—would, there was no doubt—be hurt. Steve's friendship was the most precious thing Tony had, and whether Steve accepted or declined, it wouldn't be the same. In Tony's wildest dreams, of course, it would be better, made stronger by the added facet of intimacy. However, should Steve, in all likelihood, turn him down…well. They'd had their fights, their splits, their friendship-shaking disagreements. They'd weathered a lot together, and Tony suspected they could weather his accidental infatuation as well. Even so, it would make Steve uncomfortable around him for at least a little while, and things would undoubtedly change between them. He couldn't be sure if—

Wait, where was Steve going?

He momentarily debated how creepy and or obvious it would be to follow him, then Steve disappeared out Tony's sight and rationale disappeared as well. Tony quickly side-stepped two of his investors looking to brownnose—_yep, great quarter, next year will be great, let's talk then—_and a drunken Clint singing carols—_the halls are plenty decked, dumbass, now move out of my way—_before catching a glimpse of Steve heading out a side door Tony knew led to the balcony.

Five steps all over again; this time, those five steps would put him out on a balcony on New Years. With Steve. Alone. A glance at his phone said it was 11:57, nearly midnight. If Tony wanted to try his luck at that kiss he'd have to get out there. No turning back, no changing his mind, no ducking out at the last second like some goddamn coward. He had to go because if he had even the slimmest of chances at being with Steve the way he wanted to be, he owed it to himself to try.

He slipped out the side door after Steve. The soldier was leaning over the balcony, elbows propped and eyes raised high to the stars. He had a soft smile on his face; Steve loved the stars. He was always trying to get Tony to go camping with him, offering to show him the constellations and how to navigate by them.

"See anything you like?" Tony cleared his throat.

"Sure do." Steve glanced over at him, smile never faltering.

"Oh?" Tony joined Steve in leaning over the railing. He wasn't the best with constellations, but Steve had shown him a handful before. "Where?"

"Pretty nearby." Steve made a face, a very specific face, somewhere between his indecisive face and his gathering-courage face. "Off to my right."

"Pretty vague directions there, Cap." Tony chuckled. "What's it look like?"

"Hard to describe." Steve hummed. "Pretty unique, actually. One of the most fascinating sights I've ever seen."

"Some kind of cosmic event?" Tony squinted, but he didn't see much of anything beyond some twinkly lights.

"Something like that."

Tony glanced to Steve for more guidance—seriously, he was no expert but he was pretty positive there was nothing unusual in tonight's sky—and found Steve watching him with the same smile he'd been aiming at the cosmos. Perhaps softer. Tony, caught up in the moment and the moonlight reflecting in Steve's eyes, leaned in. For a moment, he caught Steve maybe doing the same.

"Ten!" The crowd inside startled them both. "Nine!"

"Oh." Steve glanced inside. "Midnight already?"

"Eight!"

"Nearly." Tony nodded. "Ready for the New Year?"

"Seven!"

"Hope so." Steve smiled.

"Six!"

"Any resolutions?"

"Five!"

"Just one."

"Four!"

"And?"

"Three!"

"Tell you in a minute."

"Two!"

"Suit yourself, Cap."

"One!"

Tony slid a hand over Steve's shoulder to tug him in and press a kiss—_fucking hell he was such a goddamn coward—_to Steve's cheek. Before he could pull away and bluster something about New Years spirit, a warm hand wrapped around the back of his neck and turned him forward. Steve kissed softly, gentle but without hesitation.

"Look at that," Steve murmured, pulling back just an inch with a breathless, winning smile, "Already fulfilled my resolution."


	12. Nat and Tony are bros

He was more mature than this.

Well.

He was supposed to be, anyway.

"Christ, Tasha." Tony groaned. "I asked you for a spar, not a beating."

"Then spar with Steve_._" Natasha snorted, lending him a hand to haul him up.

Steve wasn't sure what that was supposed to imply. Yes, he pulled his punches with Tony a little, but he pulled his punches with everyone whose head he didn't want to cave in. If he did it a _little _more with Tony than anyone else…well, how would Natasha know, anyway?

"I'll spar with you, if you want," Steve offered anyway, trying his best not to look too eager. Tony never sparred with him anymore; he missed it more than he'd care to admit out loud.

"Nah." Tony waved him off. "I'm maybe thirty years away from winning a round with her, I don't want to get set back."

"Oh." Steve nodded quickly, punching the heavybag a little harder. "Yeah. That's fine."

"Sei un idiota," Natasha chided Tony, but there was a fondness to her tone. _You're such an idiot._

They thought he didn't speak Italian. Steve loosed a punch that would've shattered a man's jaw. He knew they thought he didn't, because they spoke it around him constantly. It was their own little shared language, Tony because his mother had spoken it to him, Natasha because she knew more languages than everyone in the Tower combined. They were always chattering away in Italian, no room for anyone else in their shared space. Every time Steve turned around they were huddled together, reading books or watching movies or sparring like old friends, talking and talking and talking.

For a little while, Steve had thought they were dating; he'd even gone and asked Clint about it. Clint had mocked him for weeks afterwards. Even without Clint's completely unhelpful teasing, Steve knew now that they weren't dating. He knew this, because nearly every time he caught them talking in Italian now, their conversations were about someone Tony only ever referred to as _tesoro; _his treasure, his beloved, his sweetheart. Any translation of it made Steve's heart hurt just the same.

When he'd first heard it, for a brief, delusional moment, Steve's hopes had been raised. Tony's sweetheart was a man. If things didn't work out with this _tesoro _person, Steve at least had a chance, right? But after weeks of overhearing these conversations, Steve knew his chances had been dead in the water from the very start. Tony was _devoted _to this person, completely and utterly head over heels for them. All Steve ever heard between Tony and Natasha now was how much Tony admired his _tesoro, _how kind and courageous and thoughtful and whatever else they were being that particular day. It was a never-ending torture, hearing Tony go on and on about good they were, how sweet they were, how disgustingly perfect they were.

Okay, so maybe Tony hadn't said _disgustingly _perfect.

Steve knew green wasn't a pretty color on anyone, but he couldn't help it. Who was _that_ good, anyway? There had to be something wrong with them. Steve just didn't want Tony to get hurt, that was all. Obviously. Tony talked about this guy like he'd hung the damn moon in the sky, but couldn't bring himself to ask him on a date for fear of rejection. What kind of guy intimidated someone like Tony? Tony was fearless, bold and brave and more than a little reckless. What made this _tesoro _person so great that he gave Tony nerves?

It hurt a little that Tony didn't trust Steve enough to talk to him about whoever he'd fallen for, but if Steve was being honest, it hurt a lot more that it wasn't him.

He hit the punching bag a little harder as Natasha and Tony's conversation inevitably turned back to the great damn _tesoro_ himself.

"Se vinco questo round, dovete chiedere a lui di uscire a cena," Natasha challenged. _If I win this round, you have to ask him out to dinner._

"Sei fuori di testa?" Tony rolled his eyes. _Are you out of your mind?_

"Lei non è più così giovane, lo sai," Natasha taunted. _You're not getting any younger, you know._

"Oh, che bello, giocare la carta età." _Oh that's nice, play the age card._Tony glared at her, going for a sweep kick. "Sapete in quale altro modo possiamo giocare la carta età? La differenza di età." _You know how else we can play the age card? The age gap._

"Come se ne frega." Natasha snorted. _As if he cares._

"E se mi preoccupo?" _And what if I care?_

"Non ti importa," Natasha informed him. _You don't care._

"Non dirmi come mi sento." Tony scowled. _Don't tell me how I feel._

"L'amore è come ti senti. Ti sto dicendo quanto sei stato, e che tu sia un idiota." _Love is how you feel. I'm telling you how you're being, and you're being an idiot._

"Non è amore," Tony denied, as he always did. _It's not love._

Natasha shot Tony the most deadpan, not amused look Steve had ever seen from her. "Hai trascorso tre ore la settimana scorsa spiegare a me in straziante dettaglio esattamente come si sarebbe il partner perfetto per lui se avrebbe dato la possibilità." _You spent three hours last week explaining to me in excruciating detail precisely how you would be the perfect partner to him if he would give you the chance._

Steve punched the heavybag harder. He remembered that conversation. Remembered all the wonderfully sweet things Tony would do for this person, how he'd always make time for them, how he'd go to the ends of the earth to protect them, how he'd tell them every day how much they meant to him and how much he appreciated them. Steve's knuckles were already starting to sting. If he didn't stop soon, they'd tear again. He didn't care.

"Viene restituito amore. Non è amore. E…" Tony sighed. _Love is returned. It's not love. It's…_ "Forte affetto per la sua esistenza in generale." _Strong affection for his general existence._

"Così mostrare il proprio apprezzamento per la sua esistenza in generale e portarlo a cena." Natasha gave a small shrug. _So show your appreciation for his general existence and take him to dinner._

"E se lui dice di no?" _And if he says no?_

"Ti offro il gelato, ci guardiamo il notebook, e mi guarderò dall'altra parte mentre piangi," Natasha told him, face completely deadpan. _I'll buy you ice cream, we'll watch the Notebook, and I'll look the other way while you cry._

"Fottiti." Tony snorted. _Screw you._

"Lui non ha intenzione di dire di no, idiota." Natasha cuffed Tony behind the head, then took him down quickly and efficiently, leg wrapping around Tony's neck. _He's not going to say no, idiot._

"I give," Tony gasped out, English returning, "Fucking hell, I give, let me up."

"Promettimi che lo chiederà a cena," Natasha responded calmly, patiently, like one would to a child. _Promise you'll ask him to dinner._

"Non riesco a respirare, fottuto imbroglione!" _I can't breathe, you fucking cheater!_

"Sì, è possibile, non essere un bambino," Natasha told him simply. _Yes, you can, don't be a baby. _"Sono stufo della telenovela. Ha intenzione di strappare aperto le nocche di nuovo se non lo metti fuori dalla sua miseria." _I'm sick of the soap opera. He's going to rip open his knuckles again if you don't put him out of his misery._

Wait, what?

"Cosa vuoi dire, la _sua_ miseria?" Tony demanded. _What do you mean, _his_misery?_ "Lo sono quello che non può respirare qui!" _I'm the one who can't breathe here!_

Steve stopped hitting the heavybag. He glanced down at his knuckles; they _were _close to tearing, little specks of blood dotting the tape he'd wrapped them in. She couldn't mean…

"Grande, ora sta guardando me, perché è lui mi guarda?" Tony muttered._Great, now he's looking at me, why is he looking at me? _"Dai, fammi vincere uno, per favore? E lo farà impressionare un po." _Come on, let me win one, please? It'll impress him a little._

Impress…who? No one else was in the gym except for him. Steve had the urge to look around for Tony's mystery man, but fought it because the pieces were sliding into place and he'd been damn stupid long enough. A swell of hope rushed up fast enough he almost couldn't breath through it, and he dropped his fighting stance by the heavybag to start over towards the ring when Natasha had Tony pinned.

"Oh dio, sta venendo, merda, mi mollare—" _Oh god, he's coming over, shit, let me up— _Natasha released him and he gulped in air for a moment before hauling himself up to raise a faux casual eyebrow at the approaching Steve. "What's up, Cap? You've got the whole determined look going on."

Steve ignored him, swinging up by the ropes and ducking into the ring. He walked straight to Tony, asking as clearly and directly as he could, "Sei innamorata di me?"

_Are you in love with me?_

Tony went white as a sheet.

"Удачи, идиоты." Natasha snorted softly in a language Steve didn't understand, exiting the ring.

He probably should've wondered what she'd said, but he didn't. He didn't care about anything in the world that wasn't Tony staring back at him, eyes wide, mouth slightly agape, until he breathed in and clenched his teeth and tightened his fists.

"You _knew?" _Tony hissed, anger and humiliation sparking. He shoved Steve, hard, and Steve let him. He knew Tony was going to take it the wrong way, but he couldn't help breaking into a beaming smile like the damn fool he was. "You fucking jackass! You spoke Italian this whole goddamn time and you let me go on pining over you like some pathetic_idiot?_ Quit_ smiling_ you fucking asshole, I can't believe you would—"

"Anch'io ti voglio bene, tesoro." Steve clasped both hands to Tony's face. _I love you too, sweetheart._

"—do that to m—oh. I. Oh." Tony swallowed. "Really?"

Steve kissed him in lieu of an answer.


	13. Mpreg (not in any way detailed)

"What the _fuck _does that mean?"

"It…" Dr. Eckman paused, clearly not understanding what a rhetorical question was. "It means you're with child, Mr. Stark."

"I know the definition of pregnant you incompetent jackass," Tony snapped, "I was asking why the hell you're using that word and my name in the same sentence. I have—I have the flu, or something! I only even _asked _you to come into my goddamn home because Steve insisted I see a doctor, but apparently we're going to have to find someone else after I sue you for gross incompetence—"

"Tony, _stop." _Steve pressed both hands to his forehead.

"Are you alri—" Dr. Eckman started.

"_Everyone,"_ Steve demanded firmly, Captain America voice in full throttle. He raised one of his hands to block the doctor from his view. "Stop. Just…stop. I need a minute."

Silence fell while Steve rubbed his palms over his eyes. They were in their bedroom, the only place they could get any privacy these days. Not to mention Steve hadn't let Tony out of bed in a week, not since he'd started throwing up half his stomach contents every morning. Even now, Tony was only sitting on the edge of the bed, Steve at his side, Dr. Eckman fidgeting nervously in front of them. Tony glared at him as poisonously as he could manage.

"Dr. Eckman." Steve breathed in once, out once. "If this is a joke, let me strongly assure you that it is absolutely not amusing."

"I promise you, I wouldn't joke about—" Dr. Eckman began.

"Then explain," Steve interrupted, and that was how Tony knew Steve was well and truly freaking out.

"I…I'm afraid I don't have an explanation, sir, Mr, uh, Captain Stark—"

"Commander," Tony corrected irritably, "He's a Commander."

"It's fine, Tony." Steve waved a hand, still focused on the doctor. "What do you mean, you don't have an explanation? If you can't explain it, how did you come to that conclusion?"

"Well, I have…some understanding." Dr. Eckman paused, frowned, then shook his head, turned to Tony. "I believe…well, externally, Mr. Stark, you're clearly male—"

"Clearly," Steve intoned dryly.

"But, uh." Dr. Eckman shot a nervous glance at Steve's tense form. "But all the tests I've run have your hormone levels as that of a females. I suspect if I were to take x-rays, your internal sex organs would be female as well."

"You can't possibly be telling me that in forty fucking years none of my doctors ever realized I had _female sex organs _you incompetent twit," Tony snarled, "Do the goddamn tests again."

"How far along is it?" Steve asked quietly.

"Don't say that." Tony looked at Steve sharply. "Don't encourage him, Steve. There is no _it, _there is nothing in me but cold pizza, a gallon of coffee, and _male_ sex organs—"

"Tony." Steve's voice was eerily quiet. "You had female everything three months ago."

"That was—" Tony sputtered, "That was _magic, _that was Loki being a fucking shithead, that has nothing to do with this."

"You were like that for two weeks, Tony. We had plenty of chances to conceive a…" Steve fell silent a moment, eyes drifting back to Tony's admittedly somewhat pudgier midsection. "…a baby."

"Do not say that word," Tony hissed, "Do _not _make this real, Steve, this is a horrible joke and I will not fall for it—"

"What if…what if you were pregnant before Loki changed you back?" Steve's brow was furrowed in thought. His gaze darted up to meet Tony's eyes finally, and he leaned in closer, took Tony's hand. "What if Loki couldn't change you all the way back? That could be why internally you're still—"

"I am _not _a _woman," _Tony snapped, yanking his hand away and standing abruptly.

"I know, sweetheart." Steve's voice went soft.

It was the same way his voice had gone soft three months ago when Tony had been freaking out about being stuck as a woman for who knew how long. He hadn't taken it well, he knew, but Steve had been nothing but kind to him through it all. He'd even kept the jokes to a minimal, and only when Tony was in the mood for them. Tony loved his husband more than anyone in the world, and those two weeks had only proven to him once again how right he was to. The first few days had been tumultuous and Tony hadn't wanted Steve anywhere near him—what if Steve had liked him _better _as a woman? What would he have done with that information?—but Steve had been so damn _Steve, _so understanding and sweet and sympathetic that of course Tony had given in. Besides, how could the scientist in him resist finding out what sex felt like for a woman?

By the fifth day of Tony's change, they were back to having sex as regularly as they always did, and neither of them had considered the change permanent enough to start using condoms again—stupid, stupid, _stupid _they were so fucking _stupid—_which meant there had been roughly twenty-five to thirty chances for them to have—have—_conceived. _Chances of conception were something like 15-25% as far Tony could remember, which meant roughly a one in seven shot, and they'd had sex at least twenty times, probably closer to thirty.

Tony had never loathed magic more in his entire life.

"So how do we deal with it?" Tony muttered to Dr. Eckman.

"What?" Steve's head snapped up.

"I asked how we deal with it, Steve. You heard me." Tony looked away.

"Dr. Eckman, I need a moment with my husband—" Steve told the doctor.

"No, you don't." Tony shook his head. "Because _you're_ not the one who may have some foreign organism feeding off you—"

"It's not a tapeworm, Tony." Steve frowned, disapproval weighing heavy on his features. "It's a baby."

"Well, don't get used to it." Tony tried to meet Steve's eyes.

"How can you say that?" The hurt in Steve's gaze was unbearable; Tony looked away again.

"How do I end it?"Tony asked Dr. Eckman as firmly as he could.

"Dr. Eckman." Steve stood abruptly, jaw clenched tight. "Give us a minute."

"Of course." Dr. Eckman gathered his things. "Yes, of course, I—I'd say congratulations, but under the—"

"Get _out," _Steve and Tony snapped at once.

"Right, sure, I'll be available by phone should you need me—"

"Don't leave the building," Steve instructed.

"Or I won't leave the building," Dr. Eckman conceded quickly, hoisting his duffel bag of supplies over his shoulder and ducking out the bedroom door.

The moment the door shut, Steve wilted. He sat back on the bed, taking Tony's hand and tugging him along gently.

"What if?" he asked quietly, and the longing in his voice nearly broke Tony's heart.

"There's no—no _what if _here—" Tony started.

"Tony." Steve squeezed his hands. "Please look at me."

"I'd rather not."

"Tony."

"Steve, I'm not…" Tony shook his head, still examining the carpet. "We've talked about this. We weren't going to adopt. How is this any different?"

"Sweetheart…" Steve brought his hands up to clasp Tony's face, gently directing his chin up so he had to make eye contact with Steve. "We _made _a _baby_. You and me. Are you really telling me that doesn't mean anything to you?"

Something Tony didn't want to identify swelled his chest, some insane combination of pride and terror, joy and misery, slamming into him harder than any other emotion he'd ever felt. Tony rapidly blinked away whatever was in his eyes, leaning forward to bury his head against Steve's chest. Steve's arms wrapped around him, warm and immediate.

"I'd be such an awful father, Steve," Tony whispered.

"Oh, honey." Steve kissed his hair, tightening his arms just a fraction. "If you were half as loving to a baby as you are to me, you'd be the best father in the world."

Tony pressed his face closer into Steve's chest, tried not to make a sound; he could feel the sting of something dangerously close to tears pricking at his eyes. Steve murmured reassurances to him without judgment, rubbing circles soothingly over Tony's back.

"It's okay, sweetheart. We'll figure this out. It's gonna be okay, I promise—"

"No." Tony shook his head miserably. "No, it's not. Nothing's going to be okay. I know you want this, Steve, but I can't, I can't do this and I can't lose you, please, I can't, please don't leave me—"

"Don't say that." Steve released him immediately, sounding like Tony had punched him in the throat. "Don't you _dare _say that."

"Steve," Tony said helplessly, "Please—"

"No." Steve shook his head. "No, how could you possibly think—"

"I know you're pro-life but this situation—"

"Tony, you—you shut the_ hell _up and you listen to me."

Steve took Tony by the shoulders, and he looked about two seconds from shaking him like a rag doll. He looked utterly devastated, hurt and angry and overwhelmed, and Tony hated himself more than ever. He was terrified of the little parasite growing in his where-the-fuck-ever, but…Steve was pro-life, and Steve clearly wanted this baby. What if they couldn't get past this? What if Steve never forgave him, if he left him? Tony was terrified of this baby, but he was so much more terrified of losing Steve—

"Listen to me." Steve clenched his jaw. "I want this baby. I do. But though it's half mine and my opinion here sure as hell matters, I am first and foremost your husband. I didn't marry you for a baby. I married you because I love you, and I'll love you for the rest of my life, baby or no baby. How could you even _suggest_ that I'd leave you over this? That I'd leave you over _anything?_ How can you possibly still think that?"

"I…" Tony swallowed. "You wouldn't?"

"Of _course _I wouldn't." Steve pulled him back into his arms. "God, Tony. How can you be so brilliant and such a damn idiot? I want you to give this decision more thought, but whatever you decide, I'm not going anywhere and I _never_ will."

It was the hormones. It hadto be, because otherwise Tony would be utterly humiliated by the way he burst into tears at Steve's words.

"I love you," Tony hiccupped, digging his fists into Steve's shirt, "I love you so much, Steve, I'm so sorry, I love you—"

"Don't be sorry." Steve held him tight and kissed his hair. "I love you too, you have nothing to be sorry about."

"I'm just—I'm scared, Steve, I'm so fucking terrified—"

"I know." Steve pulled him closer. "I know, honey. That's what I'm here for."

They stopped talking for a while after that. Steve tugged Tony into his lap, and Tony went willingly. He tucked his head against Steve's chest with an exhausted sigh, hands unconsciously dipping lower to feel his abdomen. Christ. There was a baby somewhere in there. A Steve baby. Well. Half Steve. Still, even half of Steve was enough to make a hell of a kid. Steve had so many good traits; he was brave, clever, kind, compassionate…Tony could go on for hours. He'd married the man, after all. It wasn't that he thought there _shouldn't _be a little Steve running around, because there absolutely should be. The world deserved more Steve.

And god, Steve would make an _amazing_ father. Tony had seen him bouncing their friend's babies before, cooing at them happily, letting them grasp his fingers in their little fists…he could admit, the image was sweet. Tony could see him chasing after some blonde little rascal, nagging them to eat their breakfast and pick their clothes up off the floor. Could see him making their child laugh, could see him building blanket forts and teaching them ride a bike and throwing a ball around in the park and, and…

"What if?" Tony murmured. Steve hugged him tighter.


	14. Tony is anxious about bottoming

"You don't think you're being just the littlest bit silly?" Steve raised an eyebrow at Tony, amused smile on his face. They were lying in bed together, Tony on his back, Steve propped up on his elbows to lean over him.

"Don't _mock _me," Tony hissed, "I shared my fears with you, that took courage you fucking asshole—"

"Not mocking, sweetheart." Steve ran a placating hand over Tony's shoulder, down his arm, until he linked their fingers together. He leaned in for a brief kiss. "Never mocking. Promise."

"Sounded like mocking," Tony grumbled moodily.

"I'm just pointing out that it's actually quite pleasurable—"

"Then why're you trying to change the status quo?" Tony shot back, "Can't be that great if you want to switch things around."

"Have I ever looked to you like I was having anything less than a fantastic time?" Steve raised both eyebrows this time, daring Tony to prove him wrong. Sure, he couldn't talk quite as dirty as Tony—few could—but he was plenty vocal and encouraged Tony readily.

"Admittedly…" Tony hesitated, clearly trying to think of any instance, and coming up short. "No."

"How about if I just put it in a little bit?" Steve teased, kissing him again, quick and chaste, "It won't even count."

"Steve." Tony rolled his eyes, but the corner of his mouth had that fond little uptick it always got when Tony was trying his hardest not to smile.

"How about…" Steve propped himself up on both elbows so he could put his hands roughly a foot apart. "That much? That's nothing, that's only like a quarter of it—"

Tony smacked him, but the uptick turned into a full on grin. "You're an idiot. Is that supposed to convince me?"

"It was supposed to make you laugh," Steve told him, bending down for another, lingering kiss, "Sex is supposed to be fun, remember? You told me that."

"My god, you were the absolute epitome of a nervous virgin," Tony recalled with a laugh, "All that 1940's religious guilt hanging over your head like a noose."

"And _you," _Steve gave him a peck, because he could and he wanted to, "Taught me that sex was fun. That it was natural and normal and that it felt great. You were so good to me, Tony. You took your time and you made me laugh and I felt so comfortable with you, I always do. You were gentle with me at first because I needed you to be, and I could do that for you, sweetheart, I could be careful and slow and—"

"Steve…" Tony gave an exasperated sigh, turning his head away a little. Steve used that as an opportunity to press kisses along the line of his neck. Tony gave an appreciative hum. "It isn't…uncomfortable?"

"Little bit," Steve answered honestly, because he wasn't going to lie, "For a few seconds. But uncomfortable, not painful, and if we go slow it'll barely even be that. And after the first few seconds it's wonderful, Tony."

"Wonderful, huh?" Tony mulled that over, his voice thoughtful.

"Wonderful," Steve promised, returning to kissing his way along Tony's neck enticingly, "We've got work off, the others know better than to bother us, and the chances of two supervillain attacks in one day are high, even for us…we've got all day to make it wonderful, honey."

"Steve Rogers, suggesting a lazy day of tomfoolery and shenanigans?" Tony faux gasped, doing his horrible approximation of a Brooklyn accent. "Never thought I'd see the day. Have I well and truly corrupted you at last?"

"You know I _hate it," _Steve emphasized the words with a nip to Tony's neck, "When you do that."

"Dollface, you love it when I do this." Tony grinned, still not dropping the accent.

"You sound like a cross between some country hick and a Chicago mobster, not a Brooklynite," Steve replied, letting his own quite real accent drop. Tony shivered with a pleased smile. "You jus' like making me prove you wrong."

"Little bit," Tony admitted, still beaming.

"Lotta bit," Steve corrected, settling in for another kiss, this one longer, more intense than the last. When he pulled away, Tony threw an arm over his face.

"Fine," Tony mumbled into his elbow.

"What was that, beloved?" Steve teased, kissing the hollow of Tony's throat.

"I said fine," Tony removed his arm, "Fine, yes, fuck me, but you're using at least two bottles of lube and if you break me, I'm telling everyone about how you thought a blowjob actually involved blowing on my dick."

"No, you wouldn't." Steve kissed him, completely secure in the knowledge that Tony would never actually use a personal moment between them to embarrass him like that. "But I'm going to take perfect care of you anyway."

"Yeah, yeah." Tony hooked an arm around Steve's neck, tugging him down with a fond smile. "I know."


	15. Serial killer Steve AU

Looking back, he thinks his first should've been over something important.

There should've been a snap. One, decisive moment, in which everything changed. That's the way it is in books, isn't it? There's always a reason, always a backstory, something to explain why he is the way he is. An excuse, really. Because he's many, many things, but stupid has never been one of them and he knows he wasn't always like this. He can remember what it was like, before. Can remember himself telling Erskine, _I don't want to kill anyone; I don't like bullies, I don't care where they're from _and absolutely meaning it. Can remember being so careful with his shield, with his strength, with his aim, always avoiding the killshot. More than anything, he remembers the feeling of loss over the ones he did kill—and Christ, they were damn _Nazi's—_and how the taking of a life, any life, once weighed heavily on his chest. 

His first kill was because they were in his way. 

It was maybe two minutes out of the ice. He remembers the slow dawn of wakefulness. Remembers enjoying the warmth of the sheets after a hundred—he'd thought a hundred at the time, it was only later he learned it had been seventy—years of being encased in ice. Remembers looking around with idle interest, listening to the ball game he remembers seeing for himself. Remembers getting up, and having a woman stop him. Tell him to sit down. He tells her to move out of his way. She doesn't. She should've moved. Everything would've been so much simpler if she'd moved. 

But she didn't, so he'd snapped her neck and walked by. 

Later, he tells his SHIELD-mandated therapist that he killed her because he'd thought she was a Nazi keeping him there under false pretenses. A creative lie, he thinks. It was a fair assumption, after all, and why his transgression was ultimately overlooked—being Captain America sure didn't hurt either—but it wasn't the real reason. He couldn't have been sure exactly how long he'd been stuck in the Arctic, but he sure as hell knew it wasn't the 1940's. He knew she wasn't a Nazi. He knew she was a part of the organization that had defrosted him, and he knew that before the ice, he would've cared about that. Been…grateful, he supposes. But she blocked his way, so he'd eliminated her. 

He remembers that, in the brief space between when he'd killed her and when SHIELD has descended on him, he hadn't felt anything. He hadn't felt good about killing her, but he hadn't felt bad, either. It hadn't even felt strange. His first voluntary kill, and there was no real rhyme or reason to it. She was a problem and he'd solved it. He thinks Tony might like that analysis, if he ever has to explain why he does the things he does. He doesn't really see people, anymore. He sees problems and solutions, sees end goals and means to get there. It's mathematical, in a way, though math was never really his subject. It was always art, but the ice changed that too. He doesn't draw anymore. He doesn't dwell on why. 

The pity about lying, however, is that the really good ones are the ones you have to keep to yourself, which is why he lets everyone think he was asleep for those seventy long years. That he simply took a cozy little ice nap, and woke up just in time to save their version of his world. People like that story better, anyway. Happier ending.

He used to be one of them, he thinks. Invested in the idea of happy endings, of good guys and bad guys, of superheroes and supervillains, of good always prevailing and the hero getting the girl. He doesn't know why, especially not when he never had a chance at achieving it. He was always the skinniest kid on the block, always the runt, always the pipsqueak; he was no one's hero. But he hoped. He remembers what hope felt like vividly, remembers it like a word he can't quite form, so it sits on his tongue and takes up space. He doesn't know where the feeling went. He does know he's stopped worrying about it.

It doesn't make sense, to worry. It's not logical, and Steve's all about logic. He's got three tenants to his personal philosophy, his moral code: logic, honor, and loyalty. So long as he's got these three things to guide him, he thinks he'll make out okay. 

Logic is obvious. Don't kill someone in broad daylight. Don't kill someone too high up or too powerful, their absence is noticeable. Try to make it look like an accident, or a supervillain. Don't kill someone in front of witnesses, unless you're positive you can also dispose of them before they reveal you. Watch out for cameraphones, they're small and trickier to catch than expected. The logical paths are always clear to him, whether or not he's in the mood to follow them, because the central tenant of logic is obvious. _Will this get you caught? _The rest follows.

Honor is more complex. Honor is…hard to piece apart, sometimes. He doesn't really feel much anymore, doesn't have that easy internal compass he remembers from before. He just remembers things he once thought, things like _never jump a man with his back turned _and _if you're gonna fight make it a fair one, _but these things aren't always feasible and it's hard to hold to them when he can't remember why they were so important in the first place. Besides, it's hard enough to give someone a fair chance against a supersoldier, but if he did, they might escape and tell the world what he's been doing; he might disappoint Tony, and that's not acceptable. So he adapts. Before the ice, his central tenant of honor would've been something like _don't hurt the innocent, _but after the ice, the concept of innocent is fuzzy to him. He adapts it to _only hurt the people who deserve it, _and he thinks it's roughly the same. 

Loyalty is by far the easiest for him to follow. He doesn't always feel logical, he doesn't always want to be honorable, but loyalty is something he feels deep in his bones. Loyalty is probably the only thing he's truly _felt _since leaving the ice, and maybe that's his problem. He doesn't dwell on that. He doesn't divide up his loyalties, either; that's logic kicking in, reminding him that divided loyalties might mean making choices he won't want to make, choices that shake the tenuous code he's built for himself. He can't afford that. So he's not loyal to SHIELD, though they'd say differently. He's not loyal to the Avengers, either, though they absolutely believe otherwise. In his other life, he thinks he might've felt bad about that. 

He's loyal to Tony, and Tony alone. His other obligations stem out from there. Tony doesn't trust SHIELD but he does use them, and working for SHIELD is a good way for Steve to do the same. So he pledges his loyalty to them, though if Tony asked him to even idly, he'd slit their leaders' throats and burn the Triskelion down without so much as a _why?_ He joins the Avengers because Tony asks him to, associates with them because they live in the same building and Steve's far more clever than anyone save Tony gives him credit for and he knows what he has to do to sell an act. He befriends them each in their own ways.

Thor is easily sold, a few good battles together and they're calling each other blood brother. Clint is just as easy to get friendly with—the carnie's trust is another matter, but Steve hardly has any use for that—though he likes videogames and poker. Sam is much the same, and Natasha follows them, after a mission or two where he proves his worth. Steve anticipates Bruce to be the most difficult, but finds that Bruce already likes him, because Bruce has bonded with Tony and the trust he has for Tony extends to someone Tony trusts as implicitly as he trusts Steve. 

Steve considers killing them, at first—it wouldn't be too hard, a few poor calls in the heat of battle and he could easily orchestrate a situation wherein he's only able to save one person, and who would blame him for choosing Tony?—but Tony likes them. They suck up his time sometimes, and that can make Steve moody, but Tony's happier for it so Steve is too. Steve knows Tony didn't have much of a family growing up, and that as they're both male he can hardly provide a new one; if these people make Tony feel loved, Steve won't harm them unless they pose a threat. It's the same reason he won't kill Pepper or Rhodey, either. No matter how much he enjoys plotting it out when Bruce takes too much of Tony's lab time, or Pepper calls Tony in for work when Steve has plans for him, or Thor drinks with him like Steve can't, Tony loves these people. He would be incredibly distraught by any of their deaths, and Steve can't do that to him. 

Being with Tony…it unravels him. Tony does things to him he himself doesn't fully understand, and he doubts he ever will. Steve knows he's not fully right in the head, but he also knows that he doesn't have to be to love Tony with everything that he is; there's a lot of gray in this future, but loving Tony is crystal clear to him. Steve hasn't questioned it since the moment he saw him. Being with Tony is the closest Steve gets to who he once was, to _feeling, _and he thinks Tony knows that. Steve nearly confessed to him once, after all, and his Tony is a brilliant, brilliant man. 

He has nightmares, probably always will. Tony's always there for him when he does, and one time after waking, Tony asked him if he wanted to talk about it. Steve told him everything he remembered, told him about what it felt like to crash into the arctic waters, to sink alone into an empty, inky darkness, to wait and wait and wait and finally give up on a rescue he always knew wouldn't be coming. To be cold in his bones for seventy years. He thinks he cried. He's doesn't remember, or he doesn't want to. What he does remember is Tony's arms around him through it all, Tony's blissfully alive body pressed against his as much as humanly possible, as if to pass along his very essence to Steve. He remembers Tony promising him he'd never be cold again, promising him warmth and love and anything he ever wanted, and that if Tony ever invented a time machine he'd go back and make sure that none of it ever happened, no matter the cost. Steve remembers telling him that he'd go through it all three times over if it meant he got to be here with Tony. He remembers meaning it. 

It's the closest he'll ever come to a confession, because if Tony ever gave it any real thought, he'd know that if Steve knew all along how long he'd been under, then his story about thinking the woman was a Nazi was a lie. But maybe Tony doesn't think about it, and that's okay too. Because Steve knows he's lost some things along the way—probably a little bit of his humanity, if he's feeling rational about it all—but he really would do it all again. He doesn't feel much, these days. He doesn't draw, he doesn't connect to people the way he used to, and he's fairly certain he's lost the ability to empathize altogether, but he feels for Tony. It's different than he remembers, he thinks, and that could be the ice or it could simply be that what he felt for Peggy was a different kind of love. He doesn't know. He doesn't dwell on it. He just knows that Tony is a burst of color in his black and white world, and that when Tony's around, he feels invincible. It's the closest he's been to something like happiness in over seventy years. Maybe in all his life.


	16. Tony tries heels (for nonkinky reasons)

Steve was immediately aware that something was wrong.

There wasn't anything specific and it wasn't quite his danger sense going off, but something was different and he couldn't put a finger on it. That never meant anything good. He paused completely, observing the scene with narrowed eyes. 

There was nothing immediately apparent. It was a regular Avengers breakfast. Tony had just walked in, showered and dressed to the nines for his meeting in an hour. He made a beeline for the coffee machine, as Steve had anticipated, so it was ready and waiting for him. Tony started to make off with the whole pot; Steve shot him a look. Tony scowled at him, but put the pot back for the rest of them and began to pour himself a mug instead. 

Clint had his feet on the table and was drinking orange juice straight out of the carton, which was bad, but normal—what was it about Avengers and manners that just didn't seem to mix?—and Natasha had snatched Clint's crossword away by now and was ruthlessly cutting through it with a red pen. Bruce was nursing his morning tea and flicking through the news on his StarkPad, while Thor had yet to come in. But that was all normal, even Thor's absence; he did morning workouts, and often didn't join them until halfway through. 

What _was_ it?

"How did you even fit this?" Natasha remarked to Clint, exasperated.

"It's not my fault they didn't leave enough space for the correct answer." Clint shrugged. 

"'Rust-causing agents' are called 'oxidents', Clint, it's a chemistry question." Natasha sighed. "Advanced Idea Mechanics agents don't cause rust, anyway." 

"They made Stark's suit rust that one time," Clint pointed out. 

"Still wrong." Natasha slashed off his answer. "The eggs are on fire." 

"I didn't write that." Clint frowned. 

"No, him." Natasha nodded her head at Steve, who blinked. 

"What?" 

"Your eggs are on fire." 

"Oh!" Steve turned back around, grabbed the nearest dishcloth and quickly stifled it before the smoke alarm went off. "Thanks." 

"What's with the zone-out?" Clint raised an eyebrow at him. 

"I'm not sure." Steve frowned, still thinking it over. Something was wrong. What was wrong? 

"You okay?" Tony touched his shoulder. Steve turned to face him, tell him he'd be fine, but was struck again by the sense of wrong. Tony was face to face with him, and—

"Tony?"

"Yeah?" 

"Did you grow?"

Tony laughed, kissed him without leaning up at all. "Nope." 

Which made sense, considering Steve had seen him less than an hour ago. They'd been in bed, true, but that still felt like something he would've noticed. He was absolutely certain Tony hadn't been this tall last night, though, because Steve very clearly remembered leaning down like he always did. Steve pulled himself out of his confusion long enough to examine Tony, really examine him, and found that Tony's shoes had a bit of an addition to them. 

"Are you wearing heels?" 

"Like them?" Tony grinned. "I wear them in taped interviews sometimes, gives me more of a towering look on camera." 

"Why are you wearing them now?" Steve peered at them curiously. They weren't the teetering, spindly kind he often saw Pepper and Natasha wear but regular men's leather shoes, just with a taller heel, still thick and sturdy. 

"For you," Tony said earnestly, and Clint dropped his orange juice carton on the table loudly. 

"Hey!" Clint pointed a finger at them accusingly. "We have rules for a reason, and that reason is my sanity—no discussing your kinks in public areas." 

"It's not a kink." Steve sighed at Clint, then, on second thought, not wanting to dismiss Tony if it was, "Is it a kink, honey?" 

"No." Tony rolled his eyes. "But this way we're the same height, you don't have to always lean down to kiss me. It's easier."

"Wearing heels all day is easier than leaning up an inch or two to kiss me?" Steve asked dubiously. 

He'd worn heels himself, once; the USO girls he'd travelled with had spent hours complaining about how hard it was dancing in heels, and he, young and stupid, had thought aloud that it couldn't really be that hard. They'd made him wear them for an hour, and he'd learned to keep his mouth shut on the subject except to offer foot rubs after the shows. 

"Yes?" Tony tried. 

"Go take them off." Steve laughed, kissing him again for good measure. He didn't add that he liked being able to tower over Tony a little; he'd just get an indignant sputter. "Pepper'll kill me if I let you go to the meeting like that." 

"She won't notice." Tony scoffed. "Her heels are so high she'd still be taller than me like this. Why do I only seem to hang around with tall people?"

"Tony." Steve chuckled.

"Yeah, yeah," Tony grumbled, "Half an hour and my feet are already killing me anyway." 

"Your heel game is weak, Stark." Clint snorted.

Tony raised an eyebrow at him. "What, and your heel game is strong? Why?"

"Budapest," Natasha remarked mildly, not looking up from Clint's crossword, "And 45 down is 'Hansel', Clint." 

"I'm 86.4% sure you're fucking with me," Tony declared, "And I'm not succumbing to it this time." 

"Alright," Natasha hummed.

A long pause.

"But if you felt like elaborating on Budapest and why Clint would wear heels and also providing pictures, that would be fantastic—"

"Just go change, Tony." Steve laughed. 

"Someday, one of those fuckers is going to tell me what happened in Budapest." Tony narrowed his eyes between Clint and Natasha.

"Cross-dressing assassination," Natasha said calmly, and Tony's eyes went wide. 

"_Reall—?"  
_

"Are 23 across and 78 down, respectively." Natasha smirked.

"I hate all of you," Tony announced moodily, storming off. 

"Except me?" Steve called after him with a grin. 

Tony made an exasperated sound. "Obviously!"


	17. Three Sentence Fics Part 2

**High school AU:**

It starts with some goliath of a football player shoving someone Steve doesn't know into a locker, and Steve trying uselessly to step in only to get punched in the face hard enough it knocks him out cold. When Steve wakes up, he's in the nurse's office and the very cute stranger from before is pressing a cold compress to his nose.

"I'm Stebe," Steve blurts, then blushes, embarrassed, and removes the cold compress long enough to say with a little more clarity, "I mean, Steve."

"I'm Tony. Nice to meet you, Stebe," the guy teases.

But then he smiles, and Steve's been a little blown away ever since.

**Prince and his knight AU:**

"You are without a doubt the most idiotic, foolhardy, _stubborn_ knight I have _ever_," Steve shouts loud enough for the whole castle to hear, hauling Tony past the guards and into his bedchambers by the arm, "I reiterate _ever_ met in my entire life!"

"Only as reckless as my Prince, _your highness_," Tony snaps back, the title a mockery on his tongue as it always is, until he kicks the door shut with his foot and his whole demeanor drops to tenderness, "C'mere."

They meet in the middle, Steve cupping a hand around the back of Tony's neck and Tony's hands going to his waist to pull him closer, while the guards outside roll their eyes and pretend they don't know a show when they see one.

**Steve pretends to be sick:**

"It's just, I'd love to go to the gala, of course, but I'm—I'm sick," Steve blurts, backing away from the Armani-suit-armed duo, "So, _so_ sick."

"That would explain the complete lack of symptoms," Natasha says, raising a single eyebrow at him as she continues her steady advance.

"And the immunity to every disease known to mankind," Tony agrees.

"Achoo?"

**Performer AU:**

The first time he sees Tony Stark, he knows it's love.

He immediately feels like one of the international star's many fans, awestruck and delirious and so childish for even thinking Tony would _notice_ him, but he can't help it; he's a photographer, beautiful things are his business, and there's no word for Tony Stark but beautiful. He's all tousled hair and lithe muscle and confident smirks when he asks if Steve takes pictures with his eyes or if they're going to get this photoshoot underway, and Steve wants to kick himself right up until Tony approaches him later and asks if he's a purely visual guy or if he'd be opposed to another, more _hands-on_ session.

**Mafia AU:**

There are pluses to belonging to a mafia boss—an adventuresome entrepreneur, as Tony likes to call himself—and one of them is that Steve doesn't have to think. Tony says this man lives, this man lives; Tony says that man dies, that man dies. To place that level of confidence in another person's judgment is an enormous risk—he'd never forgive himself if he killed an innocent—but Tony has earned his love, his respect and most importantly his trust more times over than Steve could ever count.

**Online Dating AU:**

"Oh my god, you're hot," is the first thing Tony blurts, then he clamps his mouth shut and his ears go red and he squeezes his eyes shut in the most adorable picture of embarrassment Steve's ever seen, "Shit, I can't believe I said that aloud, can I start over?

"You sound exactly like I imagined you," Steve offers with a smile, because he _had_ imagined Tony like this, just like he'd been online, ridiculous and a little awkward in the most charming of ways, "And if it makes you feel better, you're every bit as handsome as your pictures, too."

"So that's—this is—yeah," Tony stammers, rubbing a hand over the back of his neck, "Yeah? This is a go?"

"Yeah." Steve linked their fingers together, giving a squeeze when Tony gave him a bright smile. "This is a go."

**Tony runs away from MIT to spite his Dad:**

They've been dating for seven months and Steve has never heard one word from Tony on the subject of his father until Tony shows up at his dorm room in the middle of the night a month into their freshman year, bangs on his door until Steve gets out of bed, then all but screams about him for three hours. He threatens to quit MIT and run away to join Steve at art school; that's where Steve draws the line, because Tony _loves_ technology, lives and breathes it, and his dad may—apparently—be an asshole but even he can't ruin that for Tony and Steve won't let him. So Steve sweet-talks Tony into bed and bundles up with him in every blanket he can find and reminds him of that, reminds him that he's brilliant and innovative and is going to change the world, and he's not going to do it at an art school. Tony says _I love you, Steve_ for the first time a little after he agrees to go back to MIT on Monday and just before he falls asleep; Steve won't hold it against him if he doesn't remember, but he's also never, ever going to forget.

**Backpackers who share a bunk in a crowded hostel: **

"Crap. How do I say 'wrong bunk, asshole' in Czech?" Tony grumbles, glancing up at the guy napping on the bunk he'd been assigned.

"I wouldn't know, this asshole doesn't speak it," the guy replies, sitting up a bit to glance down at Tony with an amused smile, and _oh shit he's hot_, "But I've got the right bunk. They're double-booking tonight."

"We're sharing a bunk?" Tony's not totally sure how his libido feels about that. "That's a tiny fucking bunk."

"More of a cot, really," the guy agrees, "I'm Steve, by the way. Just so you know who you're copping a feel off of tonight."

"You—what—I would _not_," Tony denies vehemently, albeit not very effectively. Steve just laughs, giving Tony a lingering, appreciative look from head to toe.

"I didn't say I'd be complaining, did I?"

**Person A getting person B out of an abusive situation:**

In retrospect, Steve knows that punching Tiberius in the face is not the best way to react. He knows that Tony is not a damsel in distress, that he will probably be yelled at instead of thanked, and that he's still got an incredible amount of work ahead of him disproving all those bullshit lies Tiberius has been feeding Tony about himself for apparently _months_.

Still, Steve's always had a tendency to see red when Tony gets hurt, and he has to admit that the end result is incredibly satisfying.

**Food Critic Tony**

"Mm…" Tony rolls the bite around in his mouth, getting a feel for the texture and taste before finally declaring it, "Adequate."

"Adequate?" Pepper, his note taker, smacks his arm.

"Better than the last," Tony hisses, "I've tasted the true five star standard, Pepper, I can't go back. What more do you want from me?"

"I want you not to cut down every chef in the city that isn't Steve," Pepper hisses back.

"If they weren't so awful, I wouldn't have to cut them down," Tony argues, "Steve can make me orgasm with my tongue, Pepper, my _tongue_, how am I supposed to—"

She elbows him viciously; he chokes.

"Um." The young chef in front of them fiddles anxiously with his coat. "So is that…good?"

Pepper plasters on her most charming smile. "We'll get back to you."

**Looking at horoscopes:**

"What're you, a Cancer?" Tony laughs, clicking on the sign, "Let's see what crackpot info they've got on you."

They scroll through the information together, laughing at the inaccuracies, until they get to the final section.

"Who's your _love_ match?" Tony sing-songs, elbowing him.

"This says I'm best with a…" Steve abruptly stops laughing. "A, uh. Gemini."

There's a moment of awkward silence as they both make a point not to look at each other.

"Lots of those," Steve eventually points out.

"Must be," Tony agrees quickly.

"I'm sure I know plenty."

Steve tries to think of one other than Tony, and finds that he can't. He doesn't mention this out loud.

**Love at first sight:**

It's a single moment, that's all it is.

But that's all life is, really, a series of moments you can grab or let go of, so when Tony finds himself stopped in the middle of the sidewalk watching the handsome blonde stranger he just brushed shoulders with walk away, realizing he absolutely, positively, does not want this man to walk away…well.

It only takes another moment to run after him.


	18. Vampire Steve AU

Steven's real mistake is befriending a human, but really, he's so far past that point he wonders if it can even count as a mistake anymore. It's certainly nothing he can take back. Tony's a bit addictive, honestly, and Steven's spent so long alone in the quiet of his own mind that when, someday, he loses Tony once and for all, loses his company and his friendship and his eternal warmth, he will likely lose his mind as well. He can't bring himself to care.

The preventable mistake is letting Tony get him drink.

Not just drunk but utterly trashed, on more cheap booze than he's let touch his tongue in decades. They've been lying on the floor for hours now at least, Tony babbling something in Italian about the benefits of The Bite. He does it far too often for Steven's comfort—try to convince Steven to turn him, not speak Italian, Tony's Italian is lovely—but Steven blames the booze for what he says next. Lord, he hasn't been this drunk in ages.

"But then—" Steven hiccups. "Then you couldn't see."

"You're _blind?"_ Tony rolls onto his side to boggle at Steven.

"No, no," Steven starts, but Tony doesn't seem to hear him.

"How could I not know that? I know you're a _vampire_, but you don't think t'mention that you're _blind?"_

"I'm not blind, Anthony." He wants to say he chuckles, but it's really more of a giggle. He loves Anthony's full name. He knows the modern man prefers 'Tony', but 'Anthony' slips out every once in a while and Tony doesn't seem to mind when it's Steven saying it. "I mean you couldn't see you."

"I'd be invisible?" Tony rolls onto his back again, clasping both hands to his face.

"Tha's not fair. I'm too gorgeous to be invisible."

"Mhm," Steven rumbles, rolling onto his side and nuzzling Tony's neck. He's bitten him a handful of times before, mostly in desperate situations; there's no need now, Steven wouldn't even say he's particularly hungry, but Tony's blood is the sweetest in all the world, he's certain, and just smelling it is immensely pleasing.

"You're smellin' me again," Tony says, but he's scooting closer so it doesn't seem like much of a complaint.

"Cause you smell good." Steven presses his lips to Tony's neck. It's not a bite and it's not quite a kiss, some fond form of affection in between.

"C'mon, do it," Tony murmurs encouragingly, and Steven doesn't get it until he does.

"'m not gonna turn you, Tony." Steven presses a kiss to Tony's neck then, quick and decisive, before turning his head away.

"But you're a vampire," Tony insists, "And you're not invisible."

"Vampires aren't invisible." Steven frowns, confused.

"But y'said if you turned me, I couldn't see me."

"Yeah." Steven sighs morosely. "No more mirrors, or pictures, or, or anything. Ever."

"Oh." Tony gets it, and falls silent for a moment. Then, "So you don't know what you look like?"

"The same, I s'pose." Steven shrugs. The memory of what he looks like is foggy at best. He thinks he's blonde. Grey eyes. No. Green? "Tony?"

"Hm?"

"What color are my eyes?"

"Beautiful." Tony rolls towards him a little more. They're pressed together now, both tilted towards each other, and Steven's so grateful for Tony's heat he aches with it. He's not cold—at least, as far as Tony will tell him—but he's never _warm_, either. Not unless Tony's here. Tony gesticulates loosely with his free hand. "They're beautiful color. Like…like oceans. Oceans an' cloudless skies an' really bright sea glass an' blueberries. Maybe not blueberries. Too dark. Your eyes are bright. Bright bright blue. Neptune blue."

"Neptune?"

"'s a planet."

"I know what planets are."

"Your eyes are planets," Tony tells him, drunk enough to be serious as he strokes a thumb up over Steven's jaw, "An' you're my world."

"Don't say that," Steven whispers back.

He's not sure why he whispers, just that he feels he should. He feels a lot of things, like his chest is being cracked open a little wider every time Tony tells him these things, every time Tony asks him to turn him so Steven won't have to be alone anymore, every time Tony offers him his blood without hesitation if Steven so much as looks a little off-balance. Tony just _cares_ about him, so much and so effortlessly, and Steven would give him everything if it would make him happy. But it wouldn't, so he doesn't, and it breaks his heart a little more each time.

"'m gonna say it," Tony threatens.

"Tony," Steven pleads.

"You're such a fuckin' martyr," Tony growls, but he doesn't say it and he doesn't take his hand from Steven's face. He just lets it drop a little, into the crook of Steven's neck where the simple contact can still warm Steven to the core. "Whine and bitch all you want, 'm not leavin' you. How can I leave? You don't even know what you look like without me, dummy. Who else is gonna tell you 'bout the way your hair is soft and thin and blonde like sunshine? That you've got this real serious face, real manly, with all the high cheekbones and strong jaw and brows that do this, this, confuse-y thing, where they wrinkle together all adorable-like, but that when you laugh all the seriousness goes out the window cause you laugh with your whole face, your eyes go soft and crinkly and you throw your head back and you snort sometimes and then—"

Tony goes on and on, covers Steven's every feature in incredible, if often silly and nonsensical detail, and through it all, _I love you more than you will ever know_ sits as heavily on Steven's tongue as it always will.


	19. Tech store AU

"Oh shit, it's him." Clint ducks under the counter.

"You are being rude," Thor reprimands him, "What paying customer of our fine establishment are you ignoring this time?"

"Toaster Guy," Clint hisses, and that's all it takes for Thor to dive under the counter with him.

"Hello?" Toaster Guy calls as he approaches the help counter, innocent confusion coloring his voice. Clint would feel bad, but.

_Toaster Guy._

He comes in at least three times a week with some new electronic problem, despite only owning like five electronics, including his fridge and microwave. He's made everyone his unwilling victim at one point or another, even Thor, who's as helpful as they come. As the nickname implies, the guy brought in his flipping _toaster_ a month or two ago, despite the fact that toasters are not electronics, at least, not the kind they sell. But nothing had been able to dissuade the guy, and he'd insisted on seeing the manager. He _always_ insists on seeing the manager. He's a nice enough guy, but clearly dense as a brick.

Pepper's technically the manager, but when it comes to fixing things, Tony's their go-to, so they've been directing Toaster Guy to him for months. Not that Toaster Guy ever wants anyone else to help him anyway. Tony technically owns the place—thus, StarkTech—but he's usually hanging around pestering Pepper so it's close enough.

"Why is the help desk emp—oh my fucking god."

That's Tony now, staring at them incredulously, and maybe Clint should be scared about getting caught hiding from a customer by his boss' boss but he's not half as scared of Stark as he is of an hour with Toaster Guy.

"What's wrong?" Toaster Guy asks, and briefly, Clint thinks they're going to be ratted out, the customer will fire a complaint, and Tony will finally have the excuse he's been looking for to fire their asses. To be fair, Clint has not been a stellar employee lately, but also to be fair, the Three Hour Lunch Incident was totally not his fault—

"Nothing, handsome." Tony's voice goes smooth as he ignores the admittedly probably hilarious sight of Clint and Thor squished together under the counter to lean an elbow on it. Clint has no idea what that's supposed to mean. He and Thor exchange a shrug, then sit tight and stay quiet. "What can I help you with?"

"Oh." Toaster Guy's probably blushing. He sounds like the type. And Tony's an asshole, but he can charm strangers like nobody's business; it's probably why the store does so well in the first place. "My telephone is on the fritz again."

"Your telephone, huh?"

Clint can sort of see Tony's face from down here; he's got this weird half smile on his face Clint's never seen before. It occurs to him he usually just passes Toaster Guy off to Tony and runs; he's never actually seen them interact. He didn't know they were so friendly.

"Cell phone." Toaster Guy sounds sort of abashed. "Right."

"Samsung Wave525, right?"

"Uh." Toaster Guy gives a bit of a helpless laugh. "Sure? It's the same one as last time."

"And the time before." Tony chuckles. "And before and before. You're not too careful with your stuff, are you?"

"It's just…electronics," Toaster Guy says in this helpless voice that even Clint can't help finding a little charming. Still. That doesn't make up for the toaster incident. "They're so _complicated_, these days. I'm hopeless, I know, I'm sorry for always wasting your time like this—"

"Nah." Tony waves him off. "You're a smart guy, you'll pick it up. And in the meantime, that's what you've got me for."

Tony's still smiling instead of grinning, which is weird, because usually Tony gets pissy when he has to help the customers personally and that is definitely a genuine smile.

"Thor," Clint whispers, "What's up with Tony's face?"

"I believe he is smili—" is as far as Thor gets before Tony delivers a swift kick to Thor's shoulder. Clint would pity him, but Thor never really did learn to whisper.

"What was that?" Toaster Guy sounds confused again.

"Store radio," Tony lies smoothly. Clint officially has no idea what is going on. "My employees are currently misusing it."

"Oh." Toaster Guy pauses. "Are you busy? I can wait, I don't want you to get in trouble—"

"No no, hey, don't worry about it. To be honest with you, fixing things is way more my speed than dealing with rowdy employees." Tony leans over the counter a little more, and Clint is _so incredibly confused right now _because there is literally nothing Tony hates more than having to deal with dumb customers. Not to mention, since when does he pass up opportunities to tell people he owns the place? They're like the most popular tech store in New York, he's usually the first to jump on that. "So what's going on with that brick of yours this time, huh?"

"You're sure you've got the time?" Toaster Guy hesitates.

"For you, sweetheart?" Clint glances up and catches Tony doing that dopey-looking smile thing again. "All the time in the world."

"Alright." Instead of being properly creeped out, Toaster Guy sounds _pleased_. "Well, it's been doing…whatever this is, since this morning."

Toaster Guy must've passed his phone over, because there's silence for a little while. Clint sneaks a peek after a few minutes, and instead of looking at the phone and solving the problem so Clint can squeeze out of here already, Tony and Toaster Guy are gazing at each other lovingly over the busted phone. Clint pokes Tony's ankle, and Tony kicks him viciously without breaking his weird staring thing. Clint hisses, and it breaks the moment.

"Is there a cat under there?" Toaster Guy asks.

"I wish," Tony mutters, "No, the desk just makes noise sometimes. If I give it a good kick it usually learns its lesson."

"You're something else, Tony." Toaster Guy leans on the desk a bit, enough that Clint can catch a glimpse of him and his enormous, ridiculously fond smile.

"Well, uh." Is Tony Stark blushing?

"Thor," Clint whispers, "Thor, Stark's _blushing_."

"W—" Thor starts, but Clint clamps a hand over his mouth before Thor can get himself kicked again. He points at the back of Tony's neck, which is turning red in the face of Toaster Guy's bright smile. Thor's eyes widen appreciatively at the sight of this mysterious phenomenon.

"Thanks," Tony says at last, "So, uh, yeah. Your phone. Totally busted. I mean, what did you even do to it?"

"Oh, I, uh. Dropped it out a window. Eighth story window. Accidentally."

Tony gapes. _"How?"_

"Gravity?" Toaster Guy offers with a shrug. He sounds strangely unconcerned, and something's starting to smell fishy here. At least to Clint. Tony clearly doesn't notice at all.

"Well, you're gonna have to get a new one for sure." Tony pokes the old one. "Not even I can do much for this."

"Oh, darn." Toaster Guy still doesn't sound even remotely put out. "Maybe you could walk me through my options?"

"Of course." Tony nods quickly, eagerly. "Might take a little while, though. You got a free hour or so right now?"

"Yeah." Toaster Guy slides something across the counter. "Right now. Or tonight. Or this weekend."

"_Oh my god—_" The pieces click into place immediately, and Clint bangs his head on the underside of counter when he sits up too fast.

"What on earth?" Toaster Guy startles visibly when Clint pops out, but Clint just points an accusing finger.

"You've been playing dumb to seduce my boss!"

"Um." Toaster Guy pauses, glances at Tony, then back at Clint. "Why were you hiding under the counter?"

"I spent two hours trying to explain a dumb toaster to you and you were just trying to _seduce_ my _boss?"_

"You were trying to seduce me?" Tony's turning an interesting shade, the dopey smile making a comeback.

"Did it work?" Toaster Guy shoots him a dopey smile right back.

"Fuck you guys," Clint declares. He swipes the piece of paper with Toaster Guy's number on it—_Steve_ is written on the top, but fuck him, he doesn't get a name—and slaps it into Tony's hands. He informs Steve the Toaster Guy, "Tony's the store owner, not the manager, so he can leave right now and you two can go do your dumb flirting somewhere that's not my work station."

"Why did you give me your number if your phone is broken?" Tony asks, ignoring Clint completely.

"Oh." Steve gives an abashed grin. "That's not my phone, it's my friend Bucky's. He wanted a new phone and I said I'd pay for it if he let me chuck it out a window first so I could take it to you."

"Could I take you to dinner?" Tony blurts, "Or, lunch, I guess? Something? Preferably now? Or is that too—"

"Lunch sounds great." Steve smiles. Tony hops over the counter.

"You know, you don't pay me enough for all the shit he put me through," Clint points at Steve accusingly.

"Sorry." Steve rubs an embarrassed hand over the back of his neck. He doesn't really look all that sorry, though. "I didn't really know how to say 'can I just talk to your hot manager please' without sounding desperate."

"Can I keep you?" Tony loops an arm through Steve's.

"Can I get a raise?" Clint complains.

"Can I come out now?" Thor asks.


	20. Kids at summer camp AU

"Tony?" Steve's voice wavered just the littlest bit. "That was—that was some story Tasha told."

"Yeah," Tony answered, sounding very, very small in the empty, pitch-black night, "Sure was. But it's not, y'know, real or anything."

"Course not."

"Even sounds fake, huh?" Tony scooted his sleeping bag a little closer. "Hack Slinging Slasher? It's dumb."

"I thought it was Hook Hacking Slasher?" Steve scooted closer too.

"Oh yeah." Tony gulped. "The hook."

"Not that it's a real hook," Steve said quickly.

"Duh." Tony nodded immediately. "So not."

"I'm not afraid," Steve told him, glancing at his friend, "But if you were, that'd be okay."

"I'm not scared of anything." Tony jutted out his chin. "But if youwere, that'd be okay, too."

"I bet the others are scared." Steve glanced at their other campmates, the various sleeping bags strewn across the campground.

"I bet," Tony agreed, "But not us."

"Since we're the brave ones," Steve reasoned, sitting up in his sleeping bag, "We gotta stay up and protect 'em."

"Yeah." Tony sat up too, wide brown eyes just barely visible in the starlight. "Even if we hafta stay up all night and not close our eyes once."

"And turn on our flashlights to blind the Slash Hooking Hacker," Steve added, clicking his on and flashing it into the woods.

"Not that he's real," Tony said quickly, clicking his on too and doing the same.

"Not that he's real," Steve agreed just as quick, "But they don't know that."

"Right." Tony scooted closer. "We should go back to back, so we look like real watchmans."

"Good idea." Steve turned and sat with his back against Tony's, huddling his knees close to his chest as he flashed the light around. "Tony?"

"Yeah?"

"If the Slash Hooking Slinger is real…" he mumbled, "I'm glad I got you."

"Glad I got you too, Steve," Tony said quietly. Then, after a long pause. "Not that he's real."

"Course not."

They kept watch for all of eleven minutes before they fell asleep, back to back, flashlights forgotten and dropped to the ground. At least, until something rustled in the bushes, at which point both boys woke up clutching each other and screaming at the top of their lungs.


	21. Thor is a troll

"Last bite, here we go." Steve offers up the last of the banana mush to Peter, who grunts and turns his head until Steve obligingly blows out his lips and makes airplane noises. Peter giggles, and Steve manages to wriggle the spoon into his mouth.

"Such a good boy," Tony praises at Steve's side, taking Peter's bib and unclipping the tray, while Steve scoops him up.

"See, buddy?" Steve encourages, "Wasn't that yummy?"

Peter makes an eager noise in the back of his throat, and Steve's about to take him over to the sink so they can wash his hands when Thor pipes up.

"He says it wasn't quite 'yummy', but that your airplane noises were delightful enough to make up for it," Thor tells them seriously. Silence falls over the kitchen. Thor looks up innocently. "What?"

"You're not being literal, right?" Tony asks after a moment.

"Should I not speak to your son?" Thor frowns.

Steve and Tony exchange a glance.

"You understand him?" Tony clarifies, "_Explicitly_ understand? The same way you understand me, right now, with that kind of precision?"

"I have told you before of the Allspeak—" Thor looks very confused now.

"You didn't mention that it applied to _human babies_—" Steve starts in, his voice jumping up incredulously. Peter begins to whimper, and Thor gestures to him.

"He doesn't understand why you're shouting."

"I'm sorry, Petey," Steve soothes quickly, "Papa's sorry, I didn't mean to get loud."

"Yes." Thor nods sagely. "He quite likes that voice."

"You, me, Steve, and Peter." Tony gestures shortly. "Living room. Now."

"He prefers Stormaggedon," Thor informs them as he stands.

Tony gives Thor the blankest look Steve's ever seen from him. "What."

"Stormaggedon," Thor repeats, as if they were particularly slow, "Well, Stormageddon Dark Lord of All, but Stormaggedon for short."

"Right," Tony says weakly, "Short."

"He doesn't like Peter?" Steve asks, disappointed. "But I chose that name."

"He likes it fine, Steven," Thor assures, "And he is young yet, he'll grow into his name."

"He likes me, though, right?" Tony leans over to grasp Peter's little hand and smile at him. Steve can hear the note of worry in his husband's voice. "Do you like Daddy, Pete?"

Peter blows a spit bubble with a giggle. Thor smiles.

"He has nothing but the deepest adoration for you both, Anthony."

They spend an hour asking Thor questions about their son before Jane pops her head in looking for Thor, takes one look at what's going on and the expression on Thor's face, before informing them he is completely and totally messing with them.

Thor laughs so hard he nearly sprains something.


	22. Tony embarrasses Peter (again)

"Take it off."

Peter's waiting for him at the end of the armor dismantlement runway, though really, Tony hadn't expected anything less. He releases Steve so he can get out of the way, then starts up the dismantlement process.

"The suit's coming off as fast as it goes," Tony tells him innocently, "I know you're just dying to hug your dear old Dad after a long day of superheroing, but you'll have to wait just a little longer."

Steve hides a snicker. Peter is not amused.

"The sticker, Dad." Peter glares at him. "Take it off."

"Sticker?" Tony muses.

"_The_ sticker," Peter repeats with emphasis, "The one on the news."

"Was it really on the news?" Tony's eyebrows jump up.

"Their priorities are getting ridiculous." Steve sighs, and Tony's inclined to agree because seriously? Dinosaurs storm downtown and they're covering his sticker?

"It's not funny." Peter's voice goes a little petulant. "It's mortifying. My friends aren't going to let this go until I'm, like, _your_ age!"

"What do you mean, 'my' age?" Tony frowns at him. "Was that a jab? That sounded like a jab. Steve, I think our son just made a jab at me. And after I went to all the trouble of showing the whole world how very proud I am of you—"

"What are you so embarrassed of, Peter?" Steve cuts in with his most mature voice, the one Tony has long dubbed the parenting voice. It's all he can do not to laugh, because Steve is so obviously messing with Peter too and the boy doesn't have a clue. "That we love you and are proud of your accomplishments?"

"No, I…" Peter looks sullen. Tony tries to keep a straight face when Peter turns back to him. "No. But did you have to put it on the suit? You _know_ they cover any changes you make to it."

"Relax, Pete," Tony tells him, "I'll take it off."

"You will?"

"Sure, of course. JARVIS? Apparently I am no longer proud that my son is an honor student at Midtown High, remove the sticker saying so."

"Dad…" Peter makes a face, then throws his hands up. "Ugh. _Fine_. Do what you want. I'll just get beat up at school tomorrow, and the day after, and the year after, forever and ever, but who cares about that, right?"

"They'll beat you up for receiving parental affection?" Steve raises an eyebrow at Peter in amusement.

"This isn't affection, this is torture," Peter grumbles, stalking off moodily. Tony calls after him.

"So is that a no on the hug?"


	23. Tony is Bucky's younger brother AU

Bucky stopped dead in the doorway, the sight before him both horrifying and impossible to comprehend.

Well, maybe impossible wasn't totally accurate.

Steve _had_ been wanting to come over to his house a lot lately. And inviting Bucky's dumb little brother along with them everywhere they went for the sake of making him feel "included", whatever _that_ meant. And there'd been a lot of weird, Tony-centered questions lately, like what movies he liked, what clubs he was in, what he liked to do in his free time. There'd also been that one time Steve had known Tony had gone home sick from school before Bucky had, when Bucky hadn't even known they were in contact. Not to mention Tony had been a pain in the ass lately, more so than usual, about "when's Steve coming over again" and "when are we gonna hang out with Steve next" and "do you think Steve would like this shirt" and—

How the fuck had he missed this?

"So that's new," Bucky announced loudly. They both jumped about a foot in the air, breaking whatever sloppy, ill-advised saliva swap they'd been attempting.

"Bucky!" Tony shouted, "Get out of my room!"

"If you two _ever_," Bucky continued, "So much as _breathe_ on each other in my room, I will henceforth be a best-friend-less only child. Am I clear?"

"You are such a fucking douchewad," Tony grumbled, but the splotchy red on the back of his neck told Bucky the brat was properly embarrassed.

"_Am I clear?"_

"We won't do anything in your room, Bucky, I promise," Steve told him, looking contrite.

"Why the hell would we want to do anything in your disgusting pit of a room, anyway?" Tony said, which was as good as Steve's promise in Tony-ese, "Now get out and try knocking next time."

"Believe me, I will." Bucky put his hands up. "Like I need to see whatever soggy hell _that_ was ever again—"

"Out!" Tony threw a shoe at him, but Bucky closed the door before it could hit him. It thumped against the wood, followed by Tony's call of, "And I kiss perfectly fine, you fucking asshole!"

Bucky laughed, at least until Steve started reassuring Tony what a wonderful kisser he was, at which point he quickly left before the urge to puke got any worse.


	24. Tony is a biker AU

Steve's halfway down the steps outside of school when a classmate of his, Janet, stops him with an arm in his and the giddy smile that means she's got an inside scoop.

"Ohmigosh, Steve, you have to hear this, it'll just take a minute—"

Steve glances towards the parking lot. His ride's here, and her stories are _never_ a minute. "I really ought to—"

"Right, you have to go, sure, but have you seen who's in our _parking lot?_" Jan giggles, unable to hold it in.

"Who?" Steve casts a look around.

"Who _else?"_ She points.

Right by the curb, there's a large red motorcycle with gold stylings. Leaning next to it is Tony Stark himself, the helmet tucked under his arm clearly only for show; his hair's a mess from the wind, though it's a hell of a sexy mess. Steve's fingers itch to play with it. He has a confident, devil-may-care look about him, and he smirks roguishly at anyone who side-eyes him.

"You know what they say about _him_, don't you?"

"That he used to go here?"

"Of course he went here." Jan clicks her tongue, impatient with him and his inability to keep up with her stream of information. "He was supposed to graduate three years ago, but his senior prank involved explosives so they expelled him. A week before graduation and everything. But _I_ hear he's a bona fide arsonist now, rap sheet and everything."

"Really?"

"Really really. Whitney told me he's got an arrest record longer than her arm."

"How would she know?"

"She kissed him through the bars of his cell once. Gave him something to get out for."

Steve laughs. "Somehow, I doubt Whitney's ever been anywhere near a prison."

"It was the local holding station," Jan corrects, story shifting like it always does.

"Ah." Steve tries to keep a straight face. "I'm sure she did, then. So she says she's seeing him?"

"No, he's got another piece."

"Piece?" Steve can't help but break into another laugh. "Since when are you a mobster?"

"It's prison slang." Jan raises her chin at him.

"Sure. So he's got a prison boyfriend, then?"

"Yeah. I hear they're in for assault. Or breaking and entering. Maybe both."

"Maybe." Steve chuckles. "Well, I'll see you later, Jan. My ride's not too patient."

"Alright, I'll see you around, Steve." She waves as he takes the steps two at a time. Really, he's the impatient one.

"You just _had_ to take the bike." Steve grins as he approaches, and Tony beams back at him.

"Thought it'd be a nice touch." Tony hooks a finger in Steve's pants' pocket and uses it to tug him in. "You know you like it."

"I like what it does to your hair," Steve admits that much, getting a hand in Tony's mess of hair and giving a light tug. Pretty much everyone is staring at this point, and it's all Steve can do not to laugh. "_Very_ sexy."

"Gonna this _very_ sexy biker boy a kiss?" Tony goads, bumping their noses.

"Dunno if I should," Steve says innocently, in his best approximation of Jan's voice, "_I_ hear you've got a rap sheet long as my arm."

"Please, you love bad boys." Tony grins, though they both know rumors of a rap sheet are complete bull.

"Just this one." Steve kisses him then, and admittedly takes more than a little smug amusement in Jan's choked gasp.


	25. Tony and Steve meet in a car accident AU

The second Steve's ancient, beat-up Camry touches the back end of some top of the line, futuristic-looking sports car Steve can't even identify, his life flashes before his eyes. He could sell everything he owns and not even be able to afford a monthly payment for a car like that. It's just a fender bender, but still; if this guy wants to take him to court, Steve is _screwed_. He's just going to have to swallow his pride—and the fact that the other guy was the one who slammed on his brakes, Steve had absolutely been going the speed limit and keeping normal distance—and be on his absolute best manners. Polite. Respectful. Contrite.

Steve repeats this mantra to himself as he pulls over and they get out of their cars. The first thing Steve notices about the other man is that he _exudes_ rich. He's wearing a tailored suit that probably cost more than Steve's yearly rent, a gorgeous but probably equally ludicrously expensive wristwatch, and a pair of designer sunglasses. Steve kind of hates him, just a little. The man looks him over from head to toe, probably assessing his not-so-nice clothes and his beat-up car and putting the pieces together that Steve's not really worth his time. Steve doesn't kind of hate him.

Steve totally and irrationally hates him.

Polite. Respectful. Contrite.

"I'm sorry." Steve forces out. "You just slammed on your brakes—"

Damn it, he shouldn't have even mentioned—

"Oh." The man pushes his sunglasses down enough to look at Steve eye to eye, and that's not fair, he's not supposed to have eyes like _that_. "Sorry, do you _not_ stop for children in the street, or…?"

"I—" Steve stammers, because how is he even supposed to answer that? Also, he might still be a little distracted by those eyes, but that's neither here nor there. "Of course I do. And that's—it's fine, it's my fault, let's just exchange—"

"Here." The man has opened his wallet and is passing over a business card of sorts.

_Tony Stark._

_You know who I am._

Steve grits his teeth again, because this is completely unhelpful and already just so unsurprising—what's the jackass smirking at him for? "Tony" gestures for him to flip it over. The back has his job title, work address, and business phone number. Steve does his best not to look as embarrassed as he feels.

"Thank you," he says perfunctorily, holding out his insurance card. "Here's mine."

Tony glances it over, then hands it back without writing anything down. "Steve, huh?"

"Yes. Don't you need to write any of this down? Not to mention give me your insurance information?" Maybe Tony expects him to do all the legwork. He squashes down his first thought of _predictable rich jerk_ and reminds himself that as he's technically at fault he should be the one to call it in anyway. Tony's probably still a jerk, though.

"Nah." Tony gives a little wave, pulling out his phone. "Insurance companies are such a fucking hassle. I'm a mechanic first and foremost anyway, I can fix my baby up on my own. I just needed your number."

"Why?" Steve asks, distrustful and more than a little confused. Is Tony going to leave him high and dry with the insurance company? How will that work?

"So I can do this."

Steve's cell phone beeps. Tony waves for him to get it. An unknown number pops up with the text:

_10880 Malibu Point, 90265_

About all he can manage is a surprised, "What?"

"The card's got my business information. That's my home address. Bring your car by sometime, I'll fix it up for free." Tony looks him over again and Steve's about to bristle, when he adds, "You could even stay for dinner, if you wanted."

It's smooth and casual and Steve almost doesn't understand the offer for what it is, but with the sunglasses pushed down he can catch the appreciative note of Tony's stare that he'd assumed was condescension before. Tony's checking him out. It's probably what he was doing before, too, and Steve suddenly feels like world's biggest asshole. He wants to apologize, but Tony doesn't seem put off, just amused, so he figures he can apologize later.

Over dinner, maybe.


	26. Fem Steve kicks gender roles in the nads

"Tony." Steph's voice hit the pitch that meant Tony had both exasperated and endeared himself to her. It wasn't a new pitch. So she'd already heard, then. "Again?"

"He started it," Tony grumbled, leaning in for a hello kiss before continuing, "He was bragging about how Sue was in some dumb contest—"

"Homecoming, Tony." Steph's mouth gave an amused little twitch as she shut her locker and fell into step beside him. "She's a Homecoming nominee."

"Oh, that thing." Tony waved a hand dismissively.

As if they hadn't spent all of last night scouring shops downtown to find Tony a tie the exact shade of blue as Steph's dress. As if Tony hadn't spent three anxiety-ridden weeks prior to that sitting on two Homecoming tickets and trying to figure out the perfect way to ask her, because hey, being in a relationship didn't mean he could get complacent about holding on to the best damn thing he'd ever have. As if she hadn't both ruined and perfected his plans like she always did by scoring the winning touchdown in the game that put them up against Triskelion High for Homecoming, ran up to the stands and leaned over the fence enough to kiss him, then beamed at him with that brilliant, beautiful smile of hers and demanded, _you gonna take me to the dance for this thing or what?_

"All I did," Tony continued smoothly, "Was point out that nobody cares who wears some crown at some dance, because everyone is going to be busy caring about the football game that _you're_ sure to win for us—"

"Triskelion has a tough team, Tony, stop saying we're sure to win, you're going to jinx it—"

"So I maturely and respectfully corrected his horrific error in judgment," Tony steamrolled right over whatever nonsense Steph was saying that wasn't 'I'm the greatest football player that ever lived', "And informed him of the simple, factual truth."

"Did you now." Steph raised an eyebrow at him. It wasn't a question.

"Of course." Tony held his chin high.

"Shouting 'my girlfriend is too better than yours, go suck a dick, Reed' at the top of your lungs in the middle of the hallway is not mature, respectful, or the 'simple factual truth'," Steph told him, but there was a familiar quirk of fondness to her lips that told Tony he'd already been forgiven.

"Pretty sure it is though." Tony grinned.

"Pretty sure all you've done is landed yourself detention. _Again."_

"Worth it."

They'd already come to a stop outside of the classroom where detention would be held with time to spare, so he took her by the waist and moved in a little closer so he could kiss her up against the lockers. She went willingly, even tilted her head a little to deepen it. For all that she claimed exasperation with his antics, he knew she appreciated the thought behind them. It was true, anyway, no matter what she or Reed or anyone else said: Tony had the best girlfriend in the entire world, hands down and with no exceptions. It was a plain and simple fact, and the sooner people started acknowledging that Tony had won the love life lottery, the sooner he would stop getting detention for announcing it to the world. Or as Steph usually referred to it, shoving it down people's throats.

Hey, whatever it took to get the message across.

He was just so _goddamned_ proud of her. He couldn't help it. Who else could do what she had done, what she still did every day? She'd been under ninety pounds when they'd met back in freshman year, skinny as a twig—no less beautiful for it, of course not, but not exactly a linebacker—and she'd decided, come junior year, that she wanted to play football. Tony had only ever asked her the once if she was truly sure; the idea of a bunch of roid-raging assholes charging at her on a weekly basis terrified the hell out of him, but she'd wanted it badly and there wasn't a damn thing in the world Steph couldn't achieve if she wanted it so he'd supported her every step of the way since. His support had helped, he knew, but he also knew that no matter how much she liked to stroke his ego by saying she couldn't have done it without him, nothing in the world could have stopped her once she'd set her mind to it. She'd been the one to stand tall and clench her jaw, to insist that she could do this if given half the chance, when every sexist prick in the damn school had crawled out of the woodwork to take one look at her and relay some variation of the 'stick to your art stuff, sweetie' speech. One asshole had even made the mistake of outright laughing at her; Tony had gotten a black eye in his scuffle with Hodges over that particular insult to Steph's dignity, but Steph had gotten Hodges back even better by being the one to strip him of his team captain title within a year.

She'd worked so incredibly hard for this. She'd trained all summer, worked herself to the bone not just to get into "good enough" shape but to become stronger, faster and all around fucking _better_ than any of those pea-brained Neanderthals she had to compete with. She could take out their second-best player in a flat second now, how was Tony supposed to be anything short of utterly, blisteringly proud of her? He hadn't screamed it from any rooftops yet, that was about as far as he could be reasonably expected to restrain himself.

"If I didn't know better I'd think you were just trying to get out of watching this afternoon's practice." Steph broke the kiss briefly to smile at him, knowing full well that wasn't the case.

Tony had jokingly offered on more than one occasion to become her personal cheerleader, but they both knew anything involving that level of physical coordination wasn't really his speed. He was more enthusiastic than any cheerleader though, always snagging the closest seat to the field he could find at every practice and game, shouting encouragement and jumping around and generally hollering endlessly about how great she was.

"I'll be there as soon as detention gets out, promise." Tony leaned in for another kiss, quick but certainly not chaste. "I mean, unless you want to come flash the teacher so I can climb out the window early…"

"We're not re-enacting 10 Things I Hate About You." Steph rolled her eyes fondly.

"Good, because no one's allowed to see your breasts but me anyway." Tony waggled his eyebrows as suggestively as possible, hoping to elicit a blush. He didn't get a full one, but her ears went a pretty shade of pink. She wasn't a prude and certainly had no reservations when they were alone, but in public he could still rile her up a little sometimes. "What? Everyone knows I get to see your breasts. I mean, jeez, three years of pining over you, I'd sure hope so or that's just sad—"

"Would you stop being so crude about it?" Steph gave him smile far too affectionate to be reprimanding. "Someone's going to overhear you and you'll get another week for sexual harassment, or whatever else they can make up."

"I swear, Coulson isn't satisfied unless I spend half the week in detention."

"That would be Mr. Coulson to you, Mr. Stark," Coulson informed him as he rounded the corner. Tony jumped. Steph valiantly, albeit barely, held in a laugh. "And I will be satisfied when you can go one week without shouting about genitalia in the middle of a school hallway."

"You say that like it happens _often—"_ Tony started. Both Coulson and Steph shot him dry looks. "Only twice." Another look. "A couple of times, okay, fine, but to be fair it's not my fault Reed has a personality that implies cocksucking."

Steph immediately groaned.

"On that fine note." Coulson held open the door to the detention room. "I believe today we'll be going for an hour, Mr. Stark."

"I was only assigned a half hour!" Tony protested, aghast, "I'll miss almost all of Steph's practice!"

"Contrary to your personal opinion, it's not in my job description to enable your teenage infatuations. One hour, Mr. Stark, unless you've more to say on the matter of genitalia?"

The temptation was so high it bordered on painful. Steph's nails digging into his wrist in warning was just about the only thing that stopped him from blurting out the first dick joke that sprung to mind. Ha. Sprung. Steph's nails dug a little tighter and Tony sighed in concession.

"No, sir," he grumbled, turning Steph in his arms to steal one last kiss. "Love you. I'll catch the tail end of it, I promise."

"Love you too. See you soon." She raised a hand to caress a thumb over his cheek briefly before letting it drop, hoisting her bag higher on her shoulder and heading off down the hall, presumably towards the locker room. Tony wanted nothing more than to flip Coulson off and run after her.

God, he was so in love.

"You're welcome to stand out here and gawk," Mr. Coulson drawled, "But be aware that your hour only begins once you're in fact _in_ the classroom."

Tony quickly ducked inside, glancing up at the clock.

Fifty-nine minutes and fifty-nine seconds left to go.


End file.
